BLACK KITE. 101 



where De Filii)pi also found it. It is very common in the 

 Caucasus, and Messrs. Dickson and Ross obtained it at Erze- 

 room. In Palestine, according to Canon Tristram, it arrives 

 about the beginning of March in immense numbers, and 

 scatters itself over the whole country. There is much dis- 

 crepancy in the accounts of recent travellers as to its occur- 

 rence in Egypt, some stating that it is very abundant there, and 

 some avowing that they never met with it, and that another of 

 its near allies, Milrus cegyjjtius (easily recognized, when adult, 

 by its pale yellow beak), must have been mistaken for it. The 

 explanation of the difficulty probably lies in the fact that while 

 M. iegypt'ms is a resident in Egypt, M. migrans is a bird of 

 passage only, and may not always stop for the convenience 

 of other travellers on its way down or up the Nile valley. Drs. 

 von Heuglin and A. E. Brehm include it as a bird of Eastern 

 Kordofan and Abyssinia, and Mr. Blanford found it to be ex- 

 tremely common both in the highlands and lowlands of the 

 country last named. Mr. Chapman sent specimens procured 

 on the Zambesi to Mr. Layard, and Mr. Edward Newton shot 

 a bird, pronounced by Mr. Gurney to be of this species, in 

 Madagascar. Mr. Layard also records an examj)le killed at 

 Colesberg in the Cape Colony, and Andersson met with it 

 in Damaraland, where it arrives in autumn in large numbers, 

 and remains throughout the breeding-season. In West Africa 

 it has been obtained at Bissao and on the Niger. It occurs 

 in Morocco and is very common in Algeria, breeding in the 

 Atlas, but not occurring to the south of that range of moun- 

 tains, its place being taken by M. (Egyptlus. Returning to 

 Europe, it is said to be met with occasionally in Portugal, 

 and in Spain, as before noticed, it breeds. It breeds also in 

 several parts of France, and Baron de Selys-Longchamps 

 says, on the authority of M. de Meezemaeker, that it has 

 been observed at Bergues, which is only a few miles from 

 the English Channel. It does not seem to have occurred in 

 Belgium, but the Leyden Museum contains a specimen killed 

 in Holland. In Denmark it is found only in the south, and in 

 northern Germany it appears to be rare ; but more to the south 

 and eastward it breeds not uncommonlv in some localities. 



