608 GLEANINGS. 



wings and tail; quills of the primaries and adjoining parts 

 of the webs, rich chestnut; the sexes alike. The nest is in 

 trees; the 2 or 3 eggs, some 1.51x1-31, are roundish, green- 

 ish-white and " thickly spotted and blotched with deep 

 chocolate-brown and black." (Maynard.) 



The White-tailed or Black-shouldered Kite (Elanus leucu- 

 rtts), of the " South Atlantic and Gulf States, California 

 and southward, chiefly coastwise," is white, with a gull-like 

 curtain of ashy-gray over the back and wings, excepting the 

 wing-coverts, which are black. Length, 15.50; extent, 39.50. 

 The nest, in low trees, contains 4-6 eggs, roundish, white, 

 heavily marked with several shades of brown. Not com- 

 mon in its easterly range. 



The elegant Swallow-tailed Kite (Nauclerus furcatus) is 

 an abundant summer resident in the Southern, and rarely 

 reaches the Middle States. Some 22.00 long and 46.00 in 

 extent, its graceful forked tail is more than a foot in length. 

 The head, neck and under parts are white, with shafts of 

 the feathers of the head, neck and breast, black; the upper 

 parts, including the tail, black, glossed with green. Whether 

 skimming the surface, gliding over the bushes and tree-tops, 

 or circling high in air, the flight of this species is strikingly 

 beautiful. Stooping to capture a snake, he will carry it 

 high in air, and devour it at his leisure while on the wing. 

 The nest, in high tree-tops, and neatly made of sticks, weeds 

 and tillandsia, is lined with grasses, and contains 4-6 eggs, 

 1.85X1.49, oval, greenish-white, heavily marked with brown 

 of several shades. 



The Jerfalcon (Falco sacer), 2123 inches long, white, with 

 dark markings like the Snowy Owl, or dusky, cross-barred 

 with whitish, is an extremely arctic species of circumpolar 

 distribution, rarely reaching New England in*vvinter. 



The famous Wild Turkey (Afeleagris gallopavo), very well 



