386 Mr. R. Lydekker on 



paratively long in Bubo. In the Snowy Owl (Nyctea scan- 

 diaca) the tarso-metatarsus is much shorter. An entire 

 specimen of this very characteristic bone has been obtained 

 from Kent's Hole cavern, near Torquay, and is preserved in 

 the British Museum, A living example of this bird has 

 once been recorded from Devonshire ; but the occuiTcnce of 

 its remains in the caverns of France shows that the southern 

 limits of its normal range were formerly much lower than is 

 now the case. 



Accipitres. — In the Old World Accipitres, exclusive of the 

 Owl-like Pandion, the tarso-metatarsus differs from that of 

 the Striges by the flatter plane in which the distal condyles 

 are placed ; and also by the absence of the bony bridge over 

 the outer part of the depression at the upper end of the 

 front surface. The tibia likewise differs in the marked 

 flattening of the lower end, and in the presence of a bony 

 bridge over the groove on the anterior face of the same, the 

 front surfaces of the lower condyles being but very slightly 

 prominent. The Pleistocene representatives of this group 

 are three or four in number. The largest of these is repre- 

 sented by a terminal claw of the first or second digit of the 

 foot obtained by Colonel Wood from a cave at Gower, in 

 Glamorganshire, and presented by him to the British Museum. 

 This specimen was obtained in company with remains of 

 extinct mammals, and appears to have belonged either to the 

 Golden Eagle {Aquila chrysaetus) or to an equally large 

 species. The superficial deposits of Walthamstow, Essex, 

 have yielded the left tibia of a species of Haliaetus, which, 

 while differing in several respects from the corresponding- 

 bone of the European White-tailed Eagle {H. albicilla), 

 comes so close to that of H. pelagicus, of Siberia, as to 

 indicate that it belongs either to that or to a closely 

 related species. Assuming this reference to be correct, it 

 would appear to be a more marked instance of the south- 

 ward extension in Pleistocene times of northern species than 

 the one already alluded to under the head of the Snowy 

 Owl. From a cave at Berry Head, near Torbay, Sir R. 

 Owen, on page 558 of his ' British Fossil Mammals and 



