138 PALCONID^E. 



be somewhat broader and more frequently spotted and blotched. 

 One is absolutely devoid of markings, the second is very thinly 

 spotted all over with yellowish brown and very pale purple, and 

 towards the large end there are two or three large reddish-brown 

 smears ; the third egg is profusely blotched about the large end 

 with reddish brown, and has two or three large blotches of the same 

 colour on another part of the egg. The ground-colour in all is a 

 kind of greyish white, and the shell is entirely devoid of gloss. 

 In length these eggs vary from 2*4 to 2'55 inches, and in breadth 

 from 1-95 to 2'1 inches. 



As in the case of all Eagles, the eggs vary a great deal in size 

 and in the amount of markings. 



An egg taken on the 14th of May near Delhi by Major Bingham, 

 of which the parents were satisfactorily identified., has no markings, 

 except a number of very dull pale brownish subsurface-looking 

 clouds and spots, and a couple of great pale dirty brown smears. 

 Another egg, taken from a nest in the Botanical Gardens, Calcutta, 

 measures 2-5 inches in length by 1*97 in breadth, and is profusely 

 streaked and smeared and smudgily blotched with pale dingy 

 brownish red, the markings being almost confluent in a large cap 

 near the broader end. 



An egg of Aquila hastata, taken by Mr. Cripps, seems to have 

 been pure white and devoid of all natural markings, but in process 

 of incubation it has been everywhere so stained and soiled that 

 faint markings might escape attention. It measured 2*6 inches 

 by 1*96 . 



Aquila clanga, Pall. The Spotted Eagle. 



Aquila naevia (Gm.), Jerd. B. Ind. i, p. 59; Hume, Rouyh Draft 

 N. 8j E. no. 28. 



The Spotted Eagle breeds from April to June in suitable situ- 

 ations throughout Central and Northern India. Occasionally a 

 nest may be met with, like one I found near Jodhpoor, in com- 

 paratively arid districts, but almost without exception their 

 breeding-haunts are well-watered tracts, where perennial canals, 

 rivers, lakes, or swamps furnish an abundant supply of frogs, the 

 favourite food of the young. Generally these tracts are well 

 wooded, as well as well watered ; but this species breeds plenti- 

 fully, I am assured, in Sind, which can nowhere, even in the 

 neighbourhood of the large broads, which the Spotted Eagle so 

 affects, be termed well wooded. 



In the Sub- Himalayan tract, from Sikhim to the Jumna, numbers 

 of the Spotted Eagle breed, as they do also in Eaipoor and the 

 Tributary Mehals along the banks of the Mahanuddy and its 



* An interesting account of the nesting of this Eagle by the late Mr. A. 

 Anderson will be found in the ' Ibis ' for 1875, p. 199. It is too long to be 

 inserted here. ED. 



