538 Notes on the Honey Buzzard. 



streaked with brown, and more or less barred on the sides ; 

 lower tail-coverts whitish, with a few broad bars of brown. 



It is not unusual for them to have the head, neck, and all 

 the lower parts, of a dull white, with a very narrow dark 

 streak down the centre of each feather, scarcely occupy- 

 ing more than the shaft, the lores and streak through the 

 eyes continuing brown ; others have the lower parts uniform 

 brown, sometimes with a darker streak down the middle of 

 the feathers ; and there are some in which the colour, not 

 having quite diffused itself, leaves the sides of the feathers 

 whitish. The adults are much less variable than the young. 

 Their progressive changes follow the same general law as in 

 the hawk genus. 



Willughby describes the nestlings to be " covered with 

 white down, spotted with black." [Probably the dark feathers 

 appearing beyond the down ?] " Their feet," he says, " were 

 of a pale yellow ; their bills, between the nostrils and the 

 head [the cere\ white." "Les jeunes de l'annee" (meaning 

 the birds a little older), remarks Temminck, " ont la cire 

 jaune et l'iris d'un brun clair." Mr. Selby, however, as 

 quoted by Mr. Macgillivray*, states of an individual entrapped 

 in Northumberland, that "It proved a male, and an adult 

 bird, as I judged from the plumage, and pure yellow of the 

 cere and legs. Its colour is uniform deep clove-brown, very 

 unlike that of the females I have met with in collections, or of 

 the young males, which have the whole of the head and neck 

 nearly white." I have no hesitation in pronouncing this bird 

 to have been immature, and of the same age as the partially 

 white specimens adverted to. The adult female of which 

 I have described the plumage, had the irides of a dull 

 brownish yellow, and the cere dark grey. Its stomach con- 

 tained a greenish fluid matter, probably digested wasp- 

 maggots ; and it was excessively fat, and difficult to prepare, 

 on account of the liquidity of the grease. Buffbn says that, 

 "in winter, when fat, this bird is good eating." The season 

 specified is probably an inadvertent expression of that author ; 

 as, in Britain at least, it is only known as a summer visitant. 



The following particulars have been communicated to me 

 respecting a living pern, which was kept for a long while in 

 confinement. This bird was excessively tame; insomuch that 

 it was occasionally suffered to fly at large, when it was gene- 

 rally satisfied to alight on a neighbouring cage, without 

 appearing to care for exercising its wings. It evinced more 

 familiarity and confidence than an equally tame kite; but 

 appeared to be less intelligent and cunning. Sometimes it 



* Macgillivray's Rapacious Birds, p. 472. 



