SPIZ^ETUS CRISTATELLUS, (nobis). 

 Crested Spi%cetus. 



PLATE LXVI. 



S. crista occipitali, corpore supra nigro-brurmeo, infra albo, cauda, griseo-nigrescente, 

 septem fasciis nigris, apice albo, tarsis plumatis. 



Falco cristatellus, Temm. PI. Coloriees, 282. le male peu eloigne de l'etat adulte. 

 Autour cristatelle, Lesson, Man. d'Ornith. v. i. p. 94. 



"We are enabled to give a figure of this rare and beautiful species, by the 

 courtesy and polite attention of the Honourable H. T. Liddell of Esling- 

 ton-House, M. P. for Northumberland, into whose possession the speci- 

 men from which our figure is taken came under the following circum- 

 stances, which, if authenticated, will entitle it to hold a place as a rare and 

 occasional visitant in the list of British Fauna*. In the autumn of 1828, 

 Mr R. Liddell was shewn this bird by Mr John Wingate, animal pre- 

 server at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, who informed him that he received the 

 skin, a short time previous, in a fresh state, from Aberdeen, and that the 

 account he got with it, stated that it had been killed upon the coast by 

 the captain of a vessel about to enter that port. Being new as a spe- 

 cies to Mr Liddell, it was immediately purchased by him to enrich 

 the valuable collection of his brother, and soon afterwards was kindly 

 sent over to Twizell-House, for the inspection of Mr Selby, in order that, 

 if possible, the species might be determined. It appears to be the adult 

 state of Temminck's Falco cristatellus (Autour cristatelle), figured as an 

 immature male in his " Nouveau Recueil de Planches Coloriees," pi. 282, 

 and differs from it in having the upper parts of a darker brown, the fore- 

 head and under parts pure white, which he states to be the appropriate 



* Should its capture upon the British coast be satisfactorily established, Mr Selby purposes 

 to figure it of the natural size, as one of the supplemental plates of his " Illustrations of British 

 Land Birds." 



M 



