NIS/ETUS. 37 



but three have occasionally been found. They vary in shape and size, also 

 in colouring; generally they are oval, unspotted pale greyish or faintly streaked 

 and blotched with pale yellowish or reddish brown. In size they vary from 

 2*56 to 3 inches in length and from 1*95 to 2*22 in breadth. 



33. NisSBtUS pennatUS, Gm. Sys. Nat. \. p. 272 ; Tern. PI. Col. i. 

 pi. 33 ; Sharpe, Cat. Ace. p. 253 ; Murray, Vert. ZooL Sind, p. 78. Aquila 

 pennata, Vig. Zool. Journ. ; Gray, Gen. B. i. p. 14 ; Jerdon, B. of Ind. p. 63, 

 No. 31 ; Layard, B. S. Afr. p. IO; Murray, Hdbk. Zool. fyc. Sind. Hieratus 

 pennatus, Kaup. Mus. Senck. iii. p. 260; Blyth, J. A. S. B. xv. p. 7. 

 Hume, Rough Notes, i. p. 182; S. F. vol. vii. pp. 74, 198; viii. 162. The 

 DWARF or BOOTED EAGLE. 



Head and neck behind, and on the sides, rufous or pale orange brown, the 

 feathers lanceolate and streaked mesially with dark brown ; some of the 

 lengthened feathers entirely dark brown and forming a not very apparent crest. 

 A narrow superciliary stripe ; a band from the angle of the mouth below the 

 ear coverts, and a central chin stripe dark brown. Ear coverts rufescent 

 brown ; back, scapulars, and wing coverts sepia brown ; the median wing 

 coverts and some of the scapulars broadly edged with fulvous white, forming 

 a conspicuous wing band ; rump and upper tail coverts like the back, the 

 latter shading from dull fawn brown to buffy white on their margins and tips. 

 Tail dull sepia brown, shaded with ashy, tipped with fulvous white, and with 

 4 5 indistinct bars of darker brown, more distinct on the under surface. 

 Primaries dark brown, inclining to ashy white basally on their inner webs ; 

 secondaries indistinctly barred with dull brownish white. Under surface of 

 body rufous, buffy, or fulvous white, deeper on the breast, and streaked with 

 dark brown, the streaks disappearing on the abdomen, thighs, and under tail- 

 coverts, which are white. Under wing coverts white with a few narrow shaft 

 streaks. Cere and gape bright wax yellow ; bill bluish black, pale blue at the 

 base ; feet pale wax yellow ; iris pale brown. 



Length. Female 19 24 -inches ; wing 15-5 to 16 ; tail 9 to 9-25 ; tarsus 

 2-8. The young bird is paler beneath, the breast rufous or fulvous with 

 a white shoulder spot, and white lores and forehead. The upper tail coverts 

 are whitish, and the tail distinctly barred on both webs. 



Adult Male. Smaller than the female. Length 19 inches; wings 137; 

 tarsus 2 '4. 



Hab. Sind, the Punjab, N.-W. Provinces, Oudh, Beloochistan (Quetta), 

 Persia, and Afghanistan ; also the Concan, Deccan, and throughout the Indian 

 Peninsula and Ceylon. Hume says it breeds in Spain in' April and May, and 

 that Mr. Theobald found a nest in the Salem district at Huroor. The eggs 

 were two in number ; one which reached him, he says, was a very broad oval. 

 Ground colour dead white, devoid of gloss, and thickly blotched and streaked 

 throughout with reddish brown. Size 2*13 x 1-78 inches. 



