28 AQUILIN A. 
. Two birds, whose heads, necks, and upper backs correspond, 
differ entirely where the lower plumage, or perhaps _tail-feathers, 
are concerned, and vice versd. It is clear, therefore, that some 
birds change first below, others above; some earlier on the heads 
and others on the tails; thus rendering the determination of 
the comparative priority of the various forms doubly difficult. 
The adult stage is well-known. The whole head, nape, cheeks, 
ear-coverts, and sides of the neck, buff or orange-buff; the back, 
scapulars (except a few which are pure white), upper. tail- 
coverts, wing-coverts, primaries, and secondaries, chin, throat, 
breast, abdomen, leg-feathers, sides, axillaries, and wing-lining, 
deep blackish-brown ; the lesser wing-coverts margined, and the 
upper tail-coverts tipped with fulvous-white ; the lower tail- 
coverts white, and a good deal of white mottling about the 
tertiaries, which are a pale-brown; the tail grey, with a very 
broad terminal black band, occupying fully two-fifths of its 
visible surface, and above this, a number of more or less broad, 
irregular mottled, and imperfect transverse dark brown bands, 
which sometimes do, and sometimes: do not, coincide exactly at 
the shaft. 
_ This is what I take to be the perfect adult. In less advanced 
examples of this stage, the forehead, and more or less of the 
crown, are blackish-brown; the feathers of the chin and throat, 
as well as the upper breast, are margined, more or less broadly, 
with the same orange-buff as the head and nape. 
The axillaries and lower wing-coverts are more or less 
mottled with rufous; the lower tail-coverts with rufous-brown ; 
and the ground color of the tail, above the black tip, is pale 
yellowish-stone color rather than grey; the upper tail-coverts 
likewise are paler brown, and more broadly tipped with fulvous- 
white. In this stage, too, the changes are not synchronous ; 
birds most advanced about the head being often least so about 
the tail; those most advanced on the upper, least so on the 
under surface, and vice vers. | 
_ The amount of white on the scapulars, too, varies greatly ; some 
have only a single feather, others nearly the whole scapulars 
white, and I have some specimens, perfect adults, as regards 
the plumage on every other point, but exihibiting no trace 
whatsoever of white on the scapulars—Hume, “ Rough Notes.” 
The Imperial Eagle is by no means common, It occurs 
throughout the region, excepting perhaps Guzerat. 
Aquila clanga, Pail. 
28.— Aquila nevia, Gm.—Jerdon’s Birds of India, Vol. I, p. 59; 
~ Butler, Guzerat ; Stray Feathers, Vol. III, p. 445; Deccan, Stray 
Feathers, Vol. IX, p. 372; Murray’s Vertebrate Zoology of 
Sind, p. 75; Swinhoe and Barnes, Central India; Ibis, 1885, 
~ p. 56; Hume’s Scrap Book, p. 162. 
