164 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
All the forty-five eggs were very similar, and the five nests 
were all within a radius of a hundred yards. In 1885 she 
disappeared ; but at Keythorpe, from a nest in a fir-plantation, 
I took fifteen eggs consecutively. After the fifteenth egg I 
molested the bird no more. For three consecutive years she 
adapted an old pigeon’s nest to her use in one of the trees.” 
Milvus ictinus, Savigny. Kite.—Potter, in his ‘History of 
Charnwood Forest,’ says that ‘‘ one was shot from a window at 
Longcliff in the act of watching some young pigeons”; and 
Harley remarks that when a boy it was no unusual sight to 
observe a Kite passing overhead to the forest of Charnwood, and 
its bleak lone hills. It used to frequent some of the more 
retired woods, as, for example, Groby, Martenshaw, and those of 
the northern division of the county. It occurred at Belvoir 
Wood in the autumn of 1850, but there remains at the present 
day no trace of it, except in the name “ Kite Hill,” a former 
haunt. Widdowson had received three or four during the last 
twenty-five years. 
Pernis apivorus (Linn.). Honey Buzzard.—A rare summer 
visitant. An immature example was shot by a keeper at 
Martenshaw Wood on Oct. 28th, 1841. It was flushed from the 
ground, where it was feeding on the larve of the common wasp. 
Its cry, on being surprised, resembled that emitted by the Barn 
Owl. A second example was shot shortly afterwards in Lea 
Wood, near Ulverscroft, and, for want of a little knowledge of 
its rarity and value, was consigned to the ferrets. I examined a 
dark specimen in the possession of the late Mr. Widdowson, 
which was procured near Twyford Mill in September, 1881, by a 
Mr. Greasley, who for several mornings had seen it about, and 
had attempted to shoot it, when, after losing sight of it for two 
days, he was attracted to the spot, where it lay dead, by a crowd 
of little birds surrounding it. Apparently it had been killed by 
flying against the telegraph-wires. Mr. Ingram writes that one 
was shot by Mr. Lovett near Belvoir. I saw, at Noseley Hall, a 
specimen in ordinary dark plumage, shot by Sir Arthur Hazlerigg, 
some years ago. I purchased a female specimen (in the 
immature brown plumage), shot at Theddingworth on the 18th 
June, 1879, by Mr. W. Hart, jun. The weight was not taken, 
the bird being extremely thin. Length, 283in. Culmen, 1°5 in. ; 
wing, carpus to tip, 16in.; tarsus (of a dull orange yellow), 
