GRASSES, SEDGES AND SOME SEPTEMBER FLOWERS 



557 



the better part of two skeletons of this eagle, and in 

 his letter of transmittal he says: "Of the material that 

 I send you now, the head and foot belong to the Ickis 

 specimen from Argus River, eastern Rizal Province, 

 Luzon, May n, 1907 [recorded by. me in Phil. Journ. 

 Sci., Sec. A (1907) 2, 297]. All the other material is 

 from the Nueva Vizcaya specimen (lacks head, feet, and 

 wing bones left in the skin). [Recorded in Phil. Journ. 

 Sci. Sec. D (1918) 13, 14]. In separating the anterior 

 vertebrae, to make the thing short enough to go in the 

 box, I broke the anterior dorsal process of the anterior 

 vertebrae left with the trunk otherwise the specimen 

 is in good condition. It is not likely that the osteology 

 has been described unless some one has worked up the 

 material from the Seth-Smith specimen." 



All of the above mentioned skeletal parts of this 

 eagle I prepared and photographed ; it will soon be 



mentioned by all describing this great bird is its very 

 striking, full crest. Most of the feathers composing this 

 are very narrow and elongate, of a medium tan shade, 

 and each has a median longitudinal stripe of rather deep 

 russet brown. These feathers are decidedly drawn out 

 to thin, sharp points posteriorly, and are not blunt and 

 rounded as Gronvold has drawn them. A Monkey- 

 eating Eagle may weigh as much as twenty pounds. 



Grant tells us that the bill is extraordinary in shape 

 and size, the culmen being a true arc of a circle, while 

 its depth is greater than that of any known bird of prey, 

 except Pallas' Sea Eagle (Haliaetus pelagicus) , in which 

 it is sometimes a trifle greater, while such extreme nar- 

 rowness, compared with the depth, is quite unique in 

 birds of this order." To be sure it is approached by the 

 Black Cockatoo {Microglossias aterimas) ; but in none 

 of these is it laterally compressed to the same extent. 



THE LARGEST RAPTORIAL FOOT OF ANY LIVING 

 BIRD IN THE WORLD. BELONGED TO THE BIRD 

 SHOWN IN FIGURE 11 



Fig 12 The strength and the grip of this powerful foot, with 

 its great talons, exceeds that of any known bird, even sin- 

 passing the clutch of the strongest of men. 



described and compared with the skeletons of 

 various other eagles, to be, eventually, published 

 in The Philippine Journal of Science. 



The head and right foot forming a part of the 

 material sent me. had apparently been in alcohol 

 or formalin for some time, so the bones of the 

 skull were injured; still, by care and patience I 

 cleaned the specimen up. The skin of the entire 

 head and on some of the neck had been left on, as 

 well as the feathers. This afforded me an oppor- 

 tunity to secure lateral views of the head, and, by erasing 

 and restoring, I produced the head as it appears with this 

 article. All the forepart of it, from the eye on, is as we 

 find it in the living bird, the feathers being copied from 

 the ones on the feathered head sent me by Mr. McGregor 

 and referred to above. The foot was found to be essen- 

 tially perfect ; so two photographic negatives were made 

 of it ; a print from one of these is here reproduced. The 

 podotheca, or scaly covering, is, in life, of a deep orange 

 yellow. This last does not agree with Mr. McGregor's 

 description in his "New or Noteworthy Philippine Birds. 

 II. (Phil. Journ. Sci., Vol. XIII, No. I, Sec. D. January, 

 1918, pp. 14-16), where he states that the iris is pale 

 blue "a very unusual color for the eye of a raptorial 

 bird; bill dark green-blue gray, distal half black; tarsus 

 and feet pale dirty yellow, nails black." One character 



Further, those who have examined the external characters 

 in this bird, have noted the naked tarsi and feet, the 

 scutellation of which more or less nearly approaches 

 that of the Harpy Eagle (Thrasaetes harpyia). Both 

 are birds of unusual strength and size ; and, taken all in 

 all, naturalists have been led to believe that these two 

 birds are more or less nearly related ; in fact, that the 

 Harpy is its nearest relative. 



It was to settle this important point in ornithology 

 that the Bureau of Science of Manila sent me such parts 

 of the skeleton as. they possessed, in that what is now 

 suspected may either be made more certain, or refuted 

 entirely. My account of the osteology of this most re- 

 markable bird of the Philippines will appear later on in 

 the Philippine Journal of Science and I trust it will prove 

 to be of use to students of bird anatomy and classification. 



