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possible that it may extend further eastward into the south of France, though the specimen 

 figured by Jaubert and Barthelemy-Lapommeraye from the south of France is certainly Aq. 

 mogilnik and not the present species. 



All the information I have been able to collect respecting the present species is but com- 

 paratively meagre. I myself saw it once when in Spain ; but not having visited the localities 

 where it is generally found, I can say nothing respecting its habits. All the specimens I have 

 seen, excepting two procured for me from near Madrid by Manuel de la Torre, were obtained by 

 or through Lord Lilford, Major Irby, and Mr. Howard Saunders. The first-named of these 

 gentlemen informs me that " this Eagle is very common in the plains of Andalucia, especially in 

 the wild country lying to the south-west of Seville, on the right bank of the Guadalquivir, where I 

 have often met with it. It is essentially a bird of the plains ; I have never met with it nor heard 

 of its occurrence in the mountains. Its food seems to consist chiefly of rabbits. The nest, a 

 huge structure of sticks, lined with coarse grass, and occasionally a little fur and hair, generally 

 placed at the top of a tree, often not more than twenty or thirty feet from the ground, and 

 sometimes in an isolated cork tree, is not difficult to find. Last year two clutches of eggs were 

 brought to me in Seville from the Goto del Key, on the 24th of March, taken two days pre- 

 viously, with a male and female bird in fine adult plumage ; one nest contained three, and the 

 other two eggs, all quite fresh, and rather more spotted and blotched with pale rufous than 

 usual. In the first fortnight of May of the same year (1872), we found four more nests of this 

 species in the Goto de Donana, two of which contained two, and the others three young birds 

 respectively. It seems that this species does not nest till it attains the full adult plumage, which 

 is not, I think, till its fourth or fifth year, as three now alive in my possession, which we took 

 from a nest in the Co to del Eey in April 1869, have by no means fully attained it as yet (April 

 1873), though they have moulted regularly and fully every year. I have seldom myself met with 

 this species in immature plumage in Spain, though I have obtained several specimens from 

 Seville and Madrid in that state. We fed six of the young birds above mentioned in -the Goto 

 de Donana by plundering a nest near the shooting-lodge at Las Marismillas, in which we daily 

 found a young rabbit or two, and on one occasion a large rat. In fine weather the old birds soar 

 in circles at a great height, uttering now and then a short, hoarse bark." 



Major Irby informs me that it is " resident in Spain, and common in the vicinity of 

 Gibraltar, though by no means so numerous as near Cordova and Seville;" and Mr. Howard 

 Saunders writes as follows : — " Aguila real is the usual name near Seville, where it is tolerably 

 abundant, nesting in the trees of the Cotos del Eey and Donana. The habitat of this species 

 appears to be restricted to the wooded plains watered by the principal rivers of Southern and 

 Central Spain. I do not remember to have met with it alive or seen it in any local museum to 

 the north of Madrid ; nor, so far as I am aware, does it occur in the provinces of Granada, Murcia, 

 Valencia, or Cataluha ; indeed it is the only species of Spanish Eagle which has never been sent 

 to me from the neighbourhood of Granada. It frequents the whole of the wooded and flat 

 portion of the valley of the Guadalquivir, and the tributaries of that river above Cordova, and is 

 also found at the head waters of the Guadiana, near Daymiel, and probably throughout the 

 whole course of that river to the frontiers of Portugal. It again occurs on the Tagus and 

 Jarama in suitable localities ; but north of that I lost sight of it, nor could I learn any thing 



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