Q14 BIRDS. 
immaculate above; otherwise similar to the Kestrel; wings rather 
longer, and talons white. This species, long confounded with the 
preceding, prefers the south of Europe. 
F. rufipes, Beseke; F. vespertinus, Gm.; Enl. 431; Naum. 28. 
(The Grey Kestrel). The male is of a deep ash colour; the thighs 
and inferior part of the abdomen red; the back of the female ash 
coloured, spotted with black; the head, and all the under part, more 
or less red. Still smaller than the preceding; most common in 
eastern Europe; common, also, in Siberia—rare in Germany and 
France.* 
Hirroratco, Cuv. + 
The Gerfalcons have wing quills similar to those of the other noble 
birds, which they perfectly resemble in disposition; but their bill has 
only an emargination like that of the ignoble ones;{ their long and ex- 
panded tails extend considerably beyond their wings, although the latter 
are very long; the superior third of their tarsi, which are short and reti~ 
culated, is furnished with feathers. Only one species is well known. 
F’. candicans and F’. islandicus, Gm.; Buff. Enl. 210, 456, 462; 
Naum. 21, 22. (The Gerfalcon). One fourth larger than the 
Falcon, and the most highly esteemed by falconers. It is chiefly 
obtained from the north; its usual plumage is brown above, with an 
edging of paler points on each feather, and transverse lines on the 
coverts and quills; whitish below, with longitudinal brown spots, 
which, with age, are changed on the thighs into transverse lines; the 
tail is striped brown and greyish; but it so varies in the proportion 
of the brown and white, that the body of some of them is altogether 
white, and all that remains of the brown is a spot on the middle of 
each feather of the mantle; the feet and the membrane of the bill 
are sometimes yellow, sometimes blue.§$ 
* Of foreign species add, 1st, allied to the Kestrel: Le Montagnard, Vaill. 35, 
(F. capensis, Sh.)—F. sparverius, Enl. 465, Wils. II. xvi. 1, and IV. xxxii. 2, and 
two or three species, whose wings, otherwise similar to the noble birds of prey, as to 
the relative proportion of the feathers, are shorter than the tail; suchas the /. punc- 
tatus, Cuv. Col. 45.—F. columbarius, Wils. II. xv. 3. 
2d. Allied to the Hobby: F. cerulescens, Edw. 108, Vieill. Gal. 18, and Col. 97, 
hardly larger than a swallow; F. awrantius, Lath., rufogularis, Kjd., thoracicus, Illig. 
Col. 348 ;—F. bidentatus, Lath., or Bidens rufiventer, Spix. VI., which is distinguished 
by a double tooth in its bill, Col. 38, and the young, Col. 358, or Bid. albiventer, 
Spix. VII., but with wings too short;—F. diodon, Col. 198;—F. femoralis, Temm. 
Col. 121 and 348, and Spix. VIII.;—F. Aldovandii, Reinw. Col. 128. 
3d. Allied to the true Falcon: the Chiquera, Vaill. Afric. 30 (F. chiquera, Sh.); 
F. biarmicus, T. Col. 8324;—the F. huppe (F. frontalis, Daud., F. galericulatus, Sh.), 
Vaill. Afric. 28;—the F. huppart, T. (Ff. lophotes, Cuv.) Enl. 10;—the F. a culotle 
noire, Vaill. 29, (F. tibialis, Sh.) 
+ Hierax, Hiero-falco, Sacred Falcon, &c., names connected with the superstitions 
of the Egyptians respecting certain birds of prey. Gerfalcon is a corruption of 
Hiero-falco. 
+ Nauman, I., p. 278, asserts that it is the falconers who round the tooth of the 
bill in the Gerfalcons. In that case, and with the bare exception of their long tail, 
they would re-enter the catalogue of the other Falcons, and the Lanner should be 
associated with them. 
§ Add as a foreign species, the Cinereous Gerfalcon, (F. atricapillus,) Wils. V1. 
lii. 3, of which the Cinereous Buzzard, Edw. 58, (F. cinereus, Gm.); is possibly a 
young specimen. 
