SWALLOW-TAILED KITE. 
Elanus furcatus, FLEMING. 
Milvus furcatus, JENYNS. 
Nauclerus furcatus, GOULD. 
Falco furcatus, WILson. 
Elanus—Perhaps from Hlaund—To drive or chase. furcatus—Forked. 
Tuts elegant species 1s very abundant in the southern and 
south-western states of America—to the extensive prairies of 
the latter of which it is peculiarly attached, and becomes much 
less frequent towards the north, particularly on the eastern 
side of that continent. It is found also in Peru and Buenos 
Ayres. 
Two specimens only have as yet occurred in this country, 
driven over probably by _tempestuous winds. One of them 
was killed in the year 1772, at Balachoalist, in Argyleshire, 
and the other was captured in Wensleydale in Yorkshire, at 
Shaw-gill, near Hawes, on the 6th. of September, 1805. The 
‘pitiless pelting’ of a tremendous storm, and the simultaneous 
buffetings of a flock of Rooks, drove it to take shelter in a 
thicket, in which it was caught before it was able to escape. 
It was kept by the person who captured it, for a month, but 
it then made its escape through a door which had accidentally 
been left open. It alighted for a short time on a tree not 
far off, from which it soon afterwards rose upwards spirally 
to a vast height, and then, guided by its instinct, went off 
in a southerly direction as long as it could be observ ed. These 
facts are recorded in the fourteenth volume of the ‘Linnwan 
Transactions, in a letter from W. Fothergill, Esq., of Carr- 
end, near Askrigg, the next town to Hawes. 
The Swallow-tailed Kite is migratory in those countries of 
which it is an inhabitant, visiting certain parts in the spring 
to breed, and leaving them again in the autumn. 
The flight of this bird is singularly easy and graceful, as 
