RAPTORES. PERNIS. 61 



base of the tail white, the remaining part brown, band- 

 ed with a darker shade of the same colour. Toes saf- 

 fron-yellow, short ; the inner stronger, and as long as 

 the outer one. Hind and inner toes each having four 

 large scales; the outer five; the middle toe seven or 

 eight. Claws black ; long, but not much hooked. 



Genus PERNIS, Cuv. HONEY-BUZZARD. 



GENERIC CHARACTERS. 



Bill slender, weak, bending gradually from the base to the 

 tip ; with the cutting margin nearly strait. Cere occupying 

 half the length of the bill. Under mandible sloping gradu- 

 ally to the tip. Nostrils long, narrow, very obliquely placed 

 in the cere, and opening forwards. Lores thickly clothed 

 with small soft, tiled feathers. Wings long and ample ; the 

 first feather shorter than the sixth, and the third and fourth 

 the largest in the wing. Inner webs of the first four notched, 

 and the outer webs of the third, fourth and fifth sinuated. 

 Tail long and shghtly rounded. Legs having the tarsi half 

 feathered ; the lower, or naked part, being reticulated. Toes 

 rather slender, the inner and outer ones of nearly equal 

 length, the anterior joints of all scutellated. Claws weak, 

 slightly hooked, with the inner edge of the middle one di- 

 lated. 



This genus was first instituted by Cuvier, for the recep- 

 tion of the Common Honey-Buzzard and some other exotic 

 species, distinguished from the other members of this subfa- 

 mily, as well as from the rest of the Falconidce, by the com- 

 parative weakness of the bill and claws, and by the close-set 

 scale-like feathers that cover tlie lores, or that space between 

 the bill and eyes ; which part in all the rest is nearly naked 

 of feathers, but provided more or less with stiff bristles, ge- 

 nerally disposed in a radiating form. 



