482 



Adult Male (Seville). Forehead white; crown creamy sand-colour, streaked with dark brown; nape 

 similarly coloured, but washed with rufous ; centre of the back and rump dark earth-brown, with a 

 faint metallic gloss, scapulars lighter and varied with sandy grey ; quills dark blackish brown, inner- 

 most primaries and the secondaries tipped with light whitish brown, some of the inner secondaries 

 light earth-brown with darker centres ; larger wing-coverts dark brown, tipped with light sandy brown, 

 median coverts dark brown, varied with light sandy brown, all the feathers having darker centres ; 

 lesser wing-coverts like the back, but most of the feathers with paler edges ; some of the upper tail- 

 coverts dark brown, and the remainder, which are those next to the tail, creamy white, marked in the 

 centre, or on one web with dull reddish brown ; tail dark brown, narrowly tipped with creamy white, 

 several of the outer rectrices with two or three obsolete dark markings across the feathers ; sides of 

 the head and neck pale reddish brown, with dark brown central streaks, the auriculars much darker 

 than the rest ; entire underparts, including the under wing- and under tail-coverts, white ; the breast 

 slightly streaked with narrow dark reddish brown stripes, which are to a very slight extent present on 

 the flanks and under wing-coverts ; legs covered down to the feet with white feathers ; beak light bluish 

 at the base, black at the tip ; cere wax-yellow ; iris light hazel ; feet light wax-yellow ; claws black. 

 Total length 18 inches, culmen 1-5, gape 1*4, wing 14 - 0, tail 8 - 5, tarsus 2'6. 



Adult Female (Castellejo, Spain, 14th May, shot off the nest). Resembles the male, but has the upper 

 parts darker, the head darker, and more rufous, the forehead whitish, streaked with dark brown; 

 underparts pale yellowish buff on the breast, and throat washed with rufous, and much more broadly 

 streaked than the male. Culmen 1-65, gape l - 5, wing 15 - 9, tail 9 - 0, tarsus 2 - 8. 



Obs. A female from Turkey precisely resembles the male above described. 



Young Female (New Castile, May) . Resembles the bird last described, but has the entire underparts reddish 

 brown; the under wing-coverts dark brown. 



Obs. Like the Buzzard the present species differs greatly in shade of colour ; and one specimen, a male, 

 from near Constantinople, in the collection of Captain Elwes, has the upper parts much darker than any 

 of the specimens above described, in most portions of the plumage almost blackish brown, and the 

 underparts are also dark brown. That this stage of plumage is not confined to either sex is clear from 

 the fact that both males and females are found in this dark dress ; and that it is not necessarily the 

 immature dress is clearly proved by the fact that Mr. Howard Saunders possesses two nestlings taken 

 out of the same nest, which in general character of plumage resemble the adult bird, but one is very 

 light and the other is very dark. The old female bird obtained from this nest, and doubtless the 

 parent of these two birds, is dark brown like the male bird in Captain Elwes's collection ; and I have 

 deemed it necessary to give a figure of these three birds, the two nestlings being in the foreground, 

 and the female in the background on the wing. 



Besides the above dark male in Captain Elwes's collection, I have one, a very bad specimen, a male shot 

 in Turkestan by Mr. Severtzoff, which is also almost uniform blackish brown, with a chocolate tinge. 

 That these dark and light birds interbreed promiscuously is shown by Mr. Goebel and Mr. L. Holtz, 

 as well as by Mr. Howard Saunders. The white shoulder-spot, so often referred to by various authors, 

 is not clearly defined in any of the European specimens I have examined, being only indicated in one, 

 and appears to be rather uncommon; but Mr. L. Holtz describes it as being fully denned in some 

 specimens he has obtained or examined from Southern Russia ; and Naumann figures it with, the 

 underparts reddish brown, and the shoulder-patch very strongly developed, and states that the 

 specimen figured is a young male. 



