72 BIRDS OF INDIA. 



The adult bird has the occipital crest sometimes five inches 

 long, and of as many as twelve feathers of different lengths, deep 

 black, tipped with white ; the head and neck fulvescent brown, 

 with mesial dark streaks ; upper plumage glossy hair brown ; the 

 scapulars, interscapulars, and tertiaries, more or less black ; the 

 wing feathers banded more or less distinctly ; tail light greyish 

 brown, with three or four dark bands, the last one broader, and 

 all wider than those in L. niveus ; beneath, the foreneck and 

 breast pure wdiite, with a broad dark mesial streak to each feather, 

 and three dark lines on the white throat, not so distinct, however, 

 as in the last, froua all the feathers being more or less streaked ; 

 belly, flanks, vent, and under tail coverts, dark brown ; thighs the 

 same, only a little freckled with whitish ; tarsal feathers mottled 

 white and fulvous brown. 



Length of a male 24 to 25 inches ; wing 16 ; tail 11 ; tarsus 

 4 ; mid toe and claw 3. A female measured 29 inches ; wing 

 17^ ; tail 12^. Irides yellow, dun brown in the young bird; cere 

 pale yellow ; feet yellow. 



Blyth and Horsfield join this species to the last, but in this I 

 cannot agree. This is generally a larger bird, and the crest is 

 always present, and although in words the difference of the colors 

 of the two birds is not well marked, yet I think I could tell the 

 one species from the other at all ages. The larger crested Eagle 

 never, as far as we know (and I have had many specimens before 

 me from different parts of the Peninsula), assumes the uniform 

 blackish color which the smaller race does. The crested one is not 

 found in the localities which the smaller one frequents, and vice versa 

 The most prominent differences are, the long crest in this, never 

 absent, the head being darker from the first plumage, instead of 

 whitish, and continuing so at corresponding ages ; in the thigh 

 feathers being darker, and the tail bands wider. The bill, too, 

 appears to me to be more powerful and deeper ; the toes, however, 

 appear about the same size, though the tarsus is somewhat longer 

 in the crested species, in specimens of nearly equal dimensions. 



Blyth at one time considered the two races to be distinct, and 

 remarked that the dorsal feathers of this species were longer and 

 narrower than those of S, limnaetus^ which are broad and rounded. 



