438 On South African Accipitres. [Ibis, 



day seized two goat kids, cue in each foot, and would 

 no doulit liave killed both if help had not arrived in 

 time. The flight is very tine, and there are few more 

 beautiful sights than to watch a pair of these birds when 

 they arc soaring and playing together in the air, the snow- 

 white rump and edging to the mantle showing up most 

 beautifully against the jet-black of the rest of the plumage. 

 I was fortunate enough to find a nest in the Windhuk 

 district : it was situated on a ledge in the face of a sheer, 

 l)ut not very high clitf, and contained two eggs : one wiiite, 

 an almost perfect oval, very slightly broader at one end, 

 measuring 79*9 x (50'9 mm. The other was similar in shape, 

 but a good deal spotted and blotched with red-brown (dry 

 blood-colour), chiefly at the .smaller end; measurements 

 77 X 59 mm. The nest was a Inrge mass of sticks with a 

 shallow depression in the centre and lined with a thick pad 

 of narrow green leaves of a shrub growing plentifully on 

 the hills round about. This was on 5 May, 1919. The male 

 bird was on the nest when I found it, and was not particu- 

 larly wild, often a])proaching quite close while I remained 

 in the vicinity; but the female, although she circled about 

 within sight, would not come near me. Formerly this E;igle 

 was thought to have a remarkably disconnected range, 

 having only been recorded from Abyssinia and South Africa; 

 however, it has since l^een recorded from East Africa and 

 llhodesia, and now from South-west Africa, and I believe 

 that it will eventually be found to occur right through 

 Africa wherever suitable mountainous country is to be 

 found. 



As regards plumage-changes, I have not been able to 

 examine a sufficient number of specimens to he able to give 

 a definite opinion, but it would seem that there are no 

 inteimediate stages between the juvenile and adult plumages. 

 Signs of immaturity are to be seen in some specimens in 

 otherwise adult plumage, in a slight rufous edging to some 

 of the feathers on the sides of the head, and some brown 

 tipping and freckling on the otherwise white feathers on the 

 rump and sides of the mantle. 



[To be coiitimied.] 



