HALIAETUS VOCIFER. 47 
In Natal, according to Mr. Ayres, it is found frequenting the bays 
and lakes along the coast, and the same gentleman has recently 
obtained specimens in the Transvaal. 
Dr. Kirk gives the following note: “On the lakes and rivers ; 
common among the mangrove creeks of the coast; on the Zambesi, 
above the great falls, and on Lake Nyassa; in fact, wherever the 
forest comes down to the shore, or high rocks overhang it.”? Mr. 
Andersson writes as follows: “It is not an inhabitant of either 
Damara or Great Namaqua Land, but is tolerably common in the 
Lake-region and its water-sheds, and also along the course of the 
Okavango.” Senor Anchieta has quite recently procured it at 
Humbe on the River Cunéné. 
This species feeds on fish, crabs, and reptiles, and will not refuse 
earrion sheep, &c. (Le Vaillant says he has found antelope bones in 
their nests), resorting usually to some bare rock or dead tree to 
devour its quarry. 
Mr. W. Atmore records that they destroy lambs, and while on a 
visit to Mr. John Van der Byl’s farm, Nacht-wacht in the Strand- 
Veldt, we found a young bird just shot. It was still in the immature 
brown plumage, but had committed terrible depredations on our 
friend’s young lambs, slaughtering one or two daily. He was shot 
in the act and we had him to skin. 
Le Vaillant says the eggs are white, and shaped like those of a 
turkey, only larger. . One was sent to us by Mr. A. F. Ortlepp taken 
from a nest in the head of an old pollard willow growing on an 
island in the Orange River. It was white, but not so pointed as the 
ege of a Turkey. 
Adult.—Head, breast, and top of back and tail pure white; wings 
and back nearly black, the larger feathers edged with white; upper 
parts of the wing reddish-brown. Belly and thighs deep-reddish 
brown. Cere and legs yellow. Irides yellow. Length, 2’ 8”; 
tail, 11”. 
Young.—Differs from the old bird principally in being more dingily 
coloured and in not showing the contrast of colours as in the adult; 
thus the whole of the head, neck, and breast are more or less brown 
in the young, though generally giving indications of approaching 
whiteness, especially about the ears and lower breast, the crown 
being the last to change; least wing-coverts blackish, with rufous 
margins, the rest dark brown, but the greater ones for the most part 
