Mr. R. B. Sharpe’s Catalogue of Accipitres. 203 
‘several years old, and obtaimed at Altenkirchen in Rhenish 
Prussia, is described and figured in Mr. Dresser’s work. 
Having been enabled, by the kind permission of Mr. Dresser. 
to examine this interesting specimen, I may remark that his 
artist appears to me to have represented the dark markings 
on the breast of this female too much as spots, and not suffi- 
ciently as assuming, to a great extent, the arrangement of 
transverse bars of dark brown alternating with yellowish 
white. 
Some specimens of P. apivorus, both adult and immature, 
but especially the latter, when in dark plumage, show indis- 
tinct traces of a blackish stripe on either side of the neck, 
commencing sometimes just below the corner of the gape, and 
sometimes rather lower down, and extending a little more 
than halfway down the neck ; this malar stripe is interesting, 
as it is frequently much more strongly developed in the allied 
eastern species, P. ptilorhynchus. 
I have notes of measurements taken by myself from thirteen 
specimens of P. apivorus, with the following results, viz. 
Wing-measurements from 15:1 to 17°5 inches, tarsus from 
2:0 to 2°4, middle toe s.u. from 1°5 to 2:0. 
The specimen which measures 17°5 inches in the wing, is 
the one from Fantee which I have previously mentioned, 
and which appears to be a nearly adult female; the other 
twelve examples have each a wing-measurement of less than 
17 inches; and I therefore consider the figure of 17:2 
inches, given by Mr. Sharpe as the wing-measure of an 
adult male, to be an exceptionally high one. Mr. Dresser 
gives the wing-measure of an old male as 15:8, and the tarsus 
as 2 inches, and the corresponding dimensions of an old 
female as respectively 16°2 and 2:1; these figures, I think, 
represent very fairly the usual average of size in this species. 
In ‘ The Ibis’ for 1875, at p. 102, mention is made of a 
remarkably large specimen of P. apivorus, shot by Mr. N. A. 
Severtzoff in Turkestan ; but its wing-measurement, in the 
form usually cited, is unfortunately not given. 
The geographical distribution of Pernis ptilorhynchus*, 
* Mr. Sharpe spells this name as “ ptilonorhynchus ;”’ but it seems to me 
p2 
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