FALCONID^ AQUILA 297 



obsoletely barred on the inner web, below, ashy with traces of 

 bands and a darker tip. 



Iris hazel ; bill horny black, bluish ash at the base ; cere and 

 gape very pale greenish-yellow ; feet yellow, claws black. 



Length 23-5: wing 17-0; tail 9-5; culmenl-75; tarsus 2-85. 

 The male is rather smaller, length in flesh 21-0 (Ayres). A 

 young bird is brown above, with paler margins to the feathers ; 

 head paler brown with whitish bases to the feathers ; sides of the 

 head, face, and neck, and the whole of the under parts white with a 

 few remains of brown bars on the flanks, under tail and under 

 wing-coverts ; iris dark brown. 



Distribution. — The type of this species, described by Sundevall, 

 was obtained by Wahlberg in " Caffraria superiori, prope 25° lat." 

 which would correspond to western Transvaal of modern times. 

 More recently it has been met with by Exton at Kuruman* 

 in the Colony, by Ayres at Eustenburg in the Transvaal, and on the 

 Hanyani and Umfuli rivers in Mashonaland ; Mr. Monteiro sent an 

 example from Delagoa Bay ; Marshall states that it is common near 

 Salisbury ; Bocage records examples from Damaraland in the 

 Lisbon Museum. 



Beyond our limits it has been noticed in southern Angola, 

 German east Africa and north-east and west Africa, but has not yet 

 been found in Nyasaland. 



Habits. — Ayres found this bird singly or in pairs in the Magalies- 

 bergen where it was not uncommon and where it appears to feed 

 chiefly on lizards and snakes ; on one occasion he relates that his 

 brother found a pair which had killed and partly devoured a large 

 poisonous snake probably a species of Cobra [Naia) ; on another 

 occasion in Mashonaland he found a whole swallow {Hirundo dimi- 

 diata) in the crop of an individual. 



Mr. Marshall thus describes the nesting habits in Mashona- 

 land : — " Mr. C. Timmler recently shot a fine female, as she left 

 her nest. This latter was a large structure of sticks in the strong 

 fork of a large tree about twenty feet from the ground, and was 

 built with roots, grass, and a few green leaves. The single egg was 

 dirty white, with large pale blotches of brownish-grey ; it measures 

 60 X 48 mm. {i.e., 2-35 X 1-90)." An egg in the South African 

 Museum obtained by Mr. Eriksson near Huilla in Mossamedes 

 corresponds very well with these measurements, but is very fairly 



* This specimen, still preserved in the South African Museum, is labelled Kanye, 



