200 Mr. J. H. Gurney’s Notes on 
such a specimen, of a remarkably intermediate character, 
apparently a young male, from Beyrout. 
I may also mention that, in some nearly whole-coloured 
young birds of this species, the dark purplish or chocolate- 
brown which characterizes such specimens as the almost 
melanistic Sarepta male figured by Mr. Dresser, is replaced 
by a cinnamon-brown of different shades of intensity, which 
I imagine to be the same phase of plumage as that which Mr. 
Sharpe, in describing a young bird in the Leyden Museum, 
speaks of as “‘very Kite-lke in appearance :” two immature 
specimens in this cinnamon-coloured plumage were killed in 
company, whilst plundering a wasps’ nest, at Honingham, 
in Norfolk, in September 1841*; and one of them is pre- 
served in the Museum at Norwich. 
Mr. Gould figures in his ‘ Birds of Europe’ an immature 
specimen of Pernis apivorus with the entire mantle and the 
upper surface of the tail brown, but of two shades, being espe- 
cially so varied on the wing-coverts, secondaries, tertials, and 
rectrices ; the upper surface and sides of the head are clothed 
with dark brown feathers, showing conspicuous white bases ; 
and all the underparts are white, with dark brown centres to 
the feathers, increasing in breadth as they approach the tail, 
and assuming in the abdominal region the aspect of imper- 
fect transverse bars. 
Mr. Dresser also figures a very similar specimen as a 
‘young female,” taken near Berlin. 
I am disposed to think that this phase of plumage is indi- 
cative of an already commenced change from immature to 
adult dress, and that the appearance of imperfect transverse 
barring on the abdominal region is due to that cause. 
Mr. Hancock, at p.8 of his ‘Catalogue of the Birds of 
Northumberland,’ describes a similar bird, but apparently 
somewhat older, the ‘flanks, belly, thighs, and under tail- 
coverts”’ being all transversely barred, and the irides “ yel- 
low,” as an “adult female of the second or pale variety.” 
* In the early autumn of 1841 several immature specimens of Pernis 
aptvorus, in various phases of plumage, were obtained in different parts of 
Norfolk. 
