BARBAE Y FALCON. 41 
an iron rusty brown, towards the middle a darker slate black or rusty 
iron brown, commonly with blackish shaft lines to the feathers. The 
neck is a lively iron brown, generally with smoky cross streaks, darker 
around the ears, so that between this part and the dark whisker a 
small and rather circumscribed whitish space appears; forehead and 
throat whitish and unspotted, the former sprinkled with a paler rusty 
colour; the upper parts from slate to a pale ashy grey (here and there 
with rather rusty brown markings), and somewhat washed-out smoke 
black cross markings. The upper tail coverts are much clearer than 
the mantle, and more finely banded than in F. lanarius nubicus ; the 
under breast and under wing coverts (clearer or darker) a pale rusty, 
the sides sometimes sprinkled with grey; the breast in the old bird is 
unspotted. If there are any spots or cross markings on the sides and 
thighs, they are always much finer than in F. lanarius nubicus ; under 
wing coverts in the old birds unspotted, and fine, often arrow-shaped 
lines across in the young birds. The under wing coverts touch the 
points of the tail to within one inch and seven tenths, or one inch 
and nine tenths, while in Falco lanarius nubicus they are at least 
two inehes and a quarter to three inches distant. The young bird 
is very like that of the Peregrine Falcon. Hiippell and Von Homeyer 
doubt the specific distinctness of F. barbarus and feregrinus. It lives 
in deserts as well as cultivated lands. Heuglin found it in the valleys 
of the steppes which are covered with trees, on rocky mountains, and 
on ruins. A solitary date palm, sycamore, acacia, or Adansonia is, 
however, preferred to any other resting place. In Nubia it is at all 
events sedentary; but whether it leaves Egypt in winter or not is 
uncertain. Its flight is exactly like that of the Peregrine Falcon, as 
well as the mode in which it pursues its chase after wildfowl, doves, 
and water birds. It takes small birds by choice. In Egypt Heuglin 
collected a great number of eggs from eyries built on the step-shaped 
projections of the chalky mountains and on the pyramids, which 
resemble those of F. lanarius grcecus, but are smaller and covered 
with rather more strongly marked and larger rusty-brown blotches. 
They measure twenty lines and a quarter to twenty lines and three 
quarters long, and sixteen lines and five eighths to seventeen lines 
broad. 
Mr. Gurney writes to me: — "There is a curious variation among 
the adult birds of F. barbarus, some having rufous on the nape, and 
some being without it. So far as I have observed the females are 
all without it, and also some of the males, especially those in which 
the slaty-grey of the back is dark — male birds with pale grey backs 
being more often adorned with the rufous nape (I think) than the 
VOL. I. G 
