SWALLOW-TAILED KITE. 63 



ELANOIDES FURCATUS. 



SWALLOW-TAILED KITE. 



(PLATE 6.) 



Aceipiter milvus caroliniensis, Sriss. Orn. i. p. 418 (1760), 



Falco furcatus. Linn. Syst. Xat. i. p. 129 (1766); et auctorum plurimorum 



Wilson, (Attdubon), {Gould), (Bonaparte), &c. 



Milvus furcatus (Linn.), VieiU. Ois. Amer. Sept. p. 38, pi. 10 (1807). 

 Elanoides furcatus (Linn.), Bonn, et Vietil. Enc. Meth. iii. p. 1204 (1823). 

 Elanoides yetapa. Bonn, et Vieill. torn. tit. p. 1205 (1823). 

 Elanus furcatus (Linn.), Tig. Zool. Journ. i. p. 340 (1824). 

 Xauclerus furcatus (Linn.), Vig. Zool. Journ. ii. p. 387 (1825). 

 Falco yetapa (Bot.n. et VieilL), Max. Beitr. Orn. Bras. iii. Abth. i. p. 141 (1830). 

 Xauclerus forficatus (Linn.), Ridgway, Pr. Phil. Acad. 1870, p. 144. 



This singularly handsome bird appears to have once or twice wandered 

 as far as our islands, but is not known ever to have visited any other part 

 of Europe. Its claim to rank as a British bird rests upon the undoubted 

 capture of two specimens. The first of these examples was at Ballachulish, 

 in Argylshire, in the year 1772, and recorded by the late Dr. "Walker, of 

 the University of Edinburgh, in his manuscript journal for that year. 

 The first published account of this capture was made by Fleming, in his 

 ' History of British Animals/ The precise circumstances under which it 

 was taken, however, are not known. The occurrence of the second 

 specimen was recorded in the fourteenth volume of the ' Transactions of 

 the Liuneau Society/ under date November 4, 1823, by Dr. Simmons, on 

 the authority of the late Mr. Fothergill, of Carr End, near Arkrigg, in 

 Yorkshire. It was captured alive at Hardraw Scarr, near Hawes in 

 Yorkshire. Xewton, in his edition of YarrelFs ' British Birds/ further 

 corroborates the statement by publishing the original note of the bird's 

 capture, supplied to him by the son of the last-named gentleman, Mr. 

 ^Yilliam Fothergill, of Darlington. This note states that "on the 6th of 

 September, 1805, during a tremendous thunderstorm, a bird, of which a 

 correct description follows, was observed flying about in Shaw Gill, near 

 Simonstone, and, alighting on a tree, was knocked down by a stick thrown 

 at it, which, however, did not prove fatal, as I saw it alive, and had an 

 Opportunity of carefully examining it four days after it was taken. The 

 bird was kept to the 27th, and then made its escape, by the door of the 

 room being ift open while showing [it] to some company. At first it 

 arose high in the air; but being violently attacked by a party of Rooks, 

 it alighted in the tree in which it was first taken. When its keeper 



