Birds of Uruguay. 195 



tail with a darker lead-grey; breast grey^ with each feather 

 tipped with white ; belly pure white. 



83. Falco peregrinus. Peregrine Falcon. 



Two undoubted Peregrines flew over the quinta late in the 

 afternoon of the 9th November^ against a strong S.S.W. 

 wind, and seemed inclined to alight in the gumSj as they 

 came down a little. On the 8th February a lovely adult bird 

 flew over my head fairly low down ; the upper parts were pale 

 blue-grey (as well as I could see), head black, or nearly so, 

 underpai'ts buff-white. The horse I was riding was too 

 fidgety to allow me to shoot from his back, and the bird 

 would have been far away before I could have slipped otf and 

 hobbled him . I saw the Falcon subsequently, but could never 

 get a shot. A puestero living near had seen it and called it 

 the Halcon, simply. It would^ of course, be of the subspecies 

 known as Falco cassini of Sharpe (see Cat. B. i. p. 384). 



84. TiNNUNCULUs ciNNAMOMiNus. Ciunamomcous Kes- 

 trel. 



Fairly common on the Rio Negro, and often seen there 

 poised over the monte, its ringing note (like that of our 

 Kestrel, but weaker and shriller) attracting attention at 

 once. I also used to see it in the camp there sitting on 

 fence-posts or an ant-hill on the look-out for large insects. 

 On the 13th December I shot a pair in worn dress on a dead 

 tree, rotten and broken ofl^ and probably hollow at the top, 

 in which I believe they were breeding. About Sta. Elena it 

 was rare. One was reported one morning by the house- 

 peon hovering over a hedge of cactus &c., the resort of small 

 birds, near where the fowls were fed; he called it the Gavilon 

 and imitated its Kestrel wing-beating and hovering. But 

 the only one I secured at that camp was an adult female 

 over its moult on the 2.2nd April. On the 15th Febi'uary I 

 saw a pair at Las Coronas. 



-^ "^Elanus leucurus. White-tailed Kite. 

 Specimens in the Museum. 



^ ■^EosTRHAMUs sociABiLis. Sociable Marsh-Hawk. 

 Specimens in the Museum. 



