EOUGH-LEGGED BUZZAKD. 43 



variety of this species, of which the latter says that the whole 

 head, neck, and breast, are black, the feathers bordered with 

 reddish white ; the band above the thighs white, crossed with 

 black lines; the thighs and feathered tarsi rufous, crossed with 

 many narrow black bars, the black occupying rather the greater 

 portion: in these specimens the tail is white, banded near the 

 tip with a broad black bar, above which are four or five 

 narrower bars of the same colour. In some of them the throat 

 and sides of the body are quite black, very narrowly streaked 

 with yellowish white: these are considered to be the oldest 

 birds. In autumn, after moulting, all are darker than in the 

 summer, the plumage having become faded. 



Montagu describes another variety killed in Suffolk, having 

 the tail of a cream-coloured white, a brown bar, above an inch 

 in length, near the tip; above that another, half an inch 

 broad, and above these, each feather as having a spot upon 

 it in the middle, resembling, when spread, a third bar; the 

 two outer feathers on each side marked with a few irregular 

 spots of brown on the outer webs, almost the whole of their 

 length. It was probably a male, as it measured only one 

 foot ten inches in length. 



Pennant has mentioned another, shot near London, which 

 had the extreme half of the tail brown, tipped with dull 

 white ; but I see scarcely any variety in this from the ordinary 

 marking of the bird, unless it be that there were no bars in 

 the lower the brown half of the tail. 



