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must be noted, that I was then particularly anxious to find a 
Snake Hagle’s nest, none of which I had then taken, and that 
it is very improbable that had my stuffer found a nest of that 
bird, he would knowingly have represented it as belonging to 
any other; he might make a mistake, but, born and bred a fowler, 
he very rarely blundered, though he often lied. On the whole, 
the balance of probabilities were in favour of the authenticity of 
the egg, which, however, in common with all other suspected 
specimens, I long ago threw away. 
In the High Table Land of Southern India, and the Niel- 
gherries, this Hagle doubtless breeds, Jerdon mentions haying 
seen a nest in a lofty tree in the Dekhan; but of its nidification 
there, I have received no detailed account. 
These Eagles, like Fudvescens, can run very well; I have par- 
ticularly noted this on many occasions. In one place Ts say, “ This 
was a winged bird, and several times ran from twenty to thirt 
yards with very great rapidity and cleverness, and but for the 
fact of its having dropped in a newly ploughed* field, and 
there having been rain during the night, would have given a 
great chase; as it was, the soft clods tripped it up every twenty 
or thirty yards, giving it heavy falls.” 
Captain Hutton sends me the following note on this species: 
“his is a common bird about Mussooree, and in the Dhoon, 
from October to near the rainy season. The young (A. bifus- 
ciata ?) is by far the handsomer bird of the two, and likewise 
hereabouts the most common; in October we have sometimes 
seen as many as fifty together, sailing leisurely in a widespread 
flock, if such it can be called, and coming from the west, leay- 
ing individuals at intervals along the line of march. These 
appear to be all in the plumage of J. bifasciata, and judging 
from the few adults procurable here, they may almost be called 
rare. Ifa carcase be exposed as a bait, it will not lie long 
without a visit from five or six of them (4. bifasciata) ; and 
strychnine, rubbed into gashes in the thighs of the bait, is sure 
to secure some of them. I do not think they breed here. 
The changes of plumage in this species are so great, and 
hitherto appear to have been so imperfectly described, that it 
is necessary to particularize them, in some detail. When I s say 
that the changes of plumage are very great, it is under the 
assumption that all the different forms observed are really 
stages of one and the same species ; but of this there is, as yet, 
apparently no entirely conclusive proof. 
* These, with us in India, are not like ploughed fields at home. Here ridge 
and furrow fogether barely exceed 5 inches, as a rule. 
