BIRDS. 71 



Though small snakes, mice, lizards, &c., be favorite morsels with 

 this active bird, yet we are not to suppose it altogether destitute of 

 delicacy in feeding. It will seldom or never eat of anything that it 

 has not itself killed, and even that, if not in good eating order, is 

 sometimes rejected. 



The female of this species is eleven inches long, and twenty- 

 three from tip to tip of the expanded wings. The cere and legs 

 are yellow ; bill, blue, tipped with black ; space round the eye, 

 greenish blue ; iris, deep dusky ; head, bluish ash ; crown, rufous ; 

 seven spots of black on a white ground surround the head ; whole 

 upper parts reddish bay, transversely streaked with black ; primary 

 and secondary quills, black, spotted on their inner vanes with 

 brownish white ; whole lower parts, yellowish white, marked with 

 longitudinal streaks of brown, except the chin, vent, and femoral 

 feathers, which are white ; claws, black. 



The male sparrow hawk measures about ten inches in length, 

 and twenty-one in extent ; the whole upper parts of the head are 

 of a fine slate blue, the shafts of the plumage being black, the 

 crown excepted, which is marked with a spot of bright rufous ; the 

 slate tapers to a point on each side of the neck ; seven black spots 

 surround the head, as in the female, on a reddish white ground, 

 which also borders each sloping side of the blue ; front, lores, line 

 over and under the eye, chin, and throat, white ; femoral and vent- 

 feathers, yellowish white ; the rest of the lower parts, of the game 

 tint, each feather being streaked down the centre with a long black 

 drop ; those on the breast, slender, on the sides, larger ; upper part 

 of the back and scapulars, deep reddish bay, marked with ten or 

 twelve tranverse waves of black ; whole wing-coverts and ends of 

 the secondaries, bright slate, spotted with black ; primaries and 

 upper half of the secondaries, black, tipped with white, and spotted 

 on their inner vanes with the same ; lower part of the back, the 

 rump, and tail-coverts, plain bright bay ; tail rounded, the two ex- 

 terior feathers white, their inner vanes beautifully spotted with 

 black ; the next, bright bay, with a broad band of black near its 

 end, and tipped for half an inch with yellowish white ; part of its 

 lower exterior edge, white, spotted with black, and its opposite in- 

 terior edge, touched with white ; the whole of the others are very 

 deep red bay, with a single, broad band of black near the end, and 

 tipped with yellowish white ; e^ro, and legs, yellow ; orbits, the 

 same ; bill, light blue ; ins of the eye, dark, almost black ; 

 blue-black. 



