354 On the Ornithology of Wilts | Falconide]. 
its favourite food is to be found. In order to defend its head from 
the stings of the insects it robs, all the vulnerable parts between 
the beak and eyes are clothed with close-set, scale-like feathers, and 
these seem to act as a helmet of mail, proof against the weapons of 
its innumerable assailants, whose vengeance its wholesale attacks are 
sure to excite. In addition to this generic character, wherein it 
differs from all others of the same family, the tarsi are reticulated 
and the claws only partially curved. These are plain marks of 
distinction, but in plumage it presents a more extraordinary variety, 
scarcely two specimens being found to resemble each other. Mr. 
Fisher, of Yarmouth, has taken great pains to compare different 
individuals which have occurred, and to trace the remarkable change 
of plumage to which this species is liable ; and he shows, with consi- 
derable probability of correctness, which the subsequent observations 
of others have amply corroborated, that the younger the bird the 
darker its plumage, which every year increases in whiteness from 
the almost uniform dark clove brown of the immature bird, to the 
almost perfect whiteness of the adult. When it has the ash grey 
plumage on the head, it has often been called the ‘ capped’ Buzzard. 
It is of a gentle, kind, and amiable disposition, and may easily be 
domesticated, and soon becomes attached to its owner: Mr. Knox 
(who had a good opportunity of observing it) says, it has a humble 
subdued look about it, quite sufficient to distinguish it from the 
more martial members of the family, and that its gait was different 
also; instead of the hop of the sparrow-hawk or the leap of the 
falcon, and the erect attitude of those birds, its mode of progression 
was a rapid run, after the fashion of a lapwing, the head being at 
the time partially depressed; this confirms the statement of 
Willoughby, which has been copied by Buffon and Veillot, that the 
Honey Buzzard “runs very swiftly, like a hen,” as was shewn by 
Mr. Gurney in the Zoologist for 1844, page 492. I have but two 
authentic instances on which I can rely, of the occurrence of this 
rare bird in Wiltshire; one of these was seen at Roundway Park 
about ten years since, and was shot by the keeper in the act of 
destroying a wasp’s nest: Mr. Withers, who preserved it, tells me 
that he took about a dozen wasps and larvae from its stomach. 
CT ee 
