2 Notices and Descriptions of various New [No. 169. 



obscurely, though distinctly, banded : internally, the large alars are white 

 at base, as in other Buzzards : tail barred throughout with many narrowish 

 undulating bands, alternately dusky and paler, becoming successively 

 more obscure towards the base, and the subterminal dusky band 

 broadish ; beneath, the tail is albescent to near its base, and the stems 

 of the caudal feathers are very white, both above and below. Beak 

 dusky horn- coloured, yellowish laterally at base of mandibles, and with 

 apparently a livid wax- coloured cere : the toes also, and hind portion of 

 the tarsi, livid waxy ; and the talons horny- black. A very splendid 

 species, from Darjeeling. 



Another fine Buzzard, the Buteo aquilinus, Hodgson, nobis, J. A. S. 

 (March) 1845, p. 176, has since been described by Mr. Hodgson by 

 the name B. leucocephalus, in Proc. Zool. Soc. (April) 1845, p.-2-h, 37. 

 where he speaks of it as "peculiar to the Cachar and Tibet." I repeat 

 my former suggestion, that it is probably the Falco asiaticus of Latham, 

 described to inhabit China. 



A third was described by Mr. Hodgson, in the ' Bengal Sporting 

 Magazine,' for 1836, p. 182, by the name Circus plumipes, which he has 

 since altered to Buteo plumipes, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1845, p. 37, though 

 retaining his opinion of its near affinity to Circus* 



A fourth is the B. canescens, Hodgson, (vide J. A. S. XII, 308,) which 

 is decidedly the ' Nasal Falcon' of Latham ; and Mr. Jerdon now iden- 

 tifies with it his B. longipes, and I much suspect that B. rufiventer, 

 Jerdon, is merely a small male of the same. Also, I think that B. pec- 

 tor a lis, Vieillot, will prove to be no other, in which case this last speci- 

 fic name will have to be retained. I have procured specimens of this 

 bird in the neighbourhood of Kishenaghur and Moorshedabad, in Lower 

 Bengal, and have picked up an undoubted feather of it in a mangoe tope 

 much nearer to Calcutta ; but in the vicinity of Calcutta it must be 

 very rare, if it occurs at all ; preferring a more open country. 



* Mr. Hodgson has recently written me word that the Buteo plumipes, loc. cit., " is 

 a Circus osculant' to Buteo, as B. aquilinus (v. leucocephalus ) is a Buteo osculant to 

 Aquila. The >a\ter is not a typical Buteo or Archibuteo, — witness its reticulate tarse, 

 &c. &c. This; Species is inserted incorrectly in the ' Proceedings of the Zoological 

 Society.' Instead of plumipes belonging " to Buteo proper and not to Circus," it should 

 have been 'belongs not to Buteo but to Circus.' — This species 1 have never seen, 

 but must confess to theoretical doubts of its truly connecting Circus with Buteo: the 

 latter genus and Aquila, on the other hand, are very closely allied, in fact but slight 

 modifications of the same immediate subtype; and species of intermediate character 

 might have been looked for. 



