1845.] or little known species of Birds. 177 



feather ; the remaining terminal portion mingled pale and dark brown, 

 being also dark-shafted ; abdominal region and flanks, with the tibial 

 plumes, dark brown, slightly rufous -edged towards the breast, and the 

 axillaries more vividly rufescent ; fore part of the under surface of 

 the wing dusky-brown, the primaries freckled white beneath, except 

 beyond their emargination where they become blackish ; tail mottled 

 with numerous dark bars, alternate on the two shafts of each feather, 

 upon an albescent ground. Bill dark, as is apparently the cere : the 

 toes appear to have been wax-yellow. 



This bird might be mistaken, on a cursory view, for a variety of B, 

 canescens, J. A. S. xii, 308, were it not for its half- feathered tarsi ; and 

 the beak also is larger and more aquiline, so that the name is felici- 

 tously bestowed. It is by no means a common species in Nepal, as I 

 learned from Mr. Hodgson's people, and as might be inferred from the 

 circumstance of Mr. Hodgson requiring the only specimen he had sent, 

 to take with him to England. Not improbably it may prove identical 

 with the Falco asiaticus of Latham, described as nearly similar to the 

 European Buzzard in the colour of its body and wings, the under parts 

 white with stripes on the breast, tail silver-grey, the outer feather 

 marked by obscure bars ; bill bluish-black, and legs yellow and half 

 feathered. Length twenty-two inches. Inhabits China." From the 

 circumstance of its partially feathered tarse, it might be presumed 

 that the present species would fall under the division Archibuteo 

 of Brehm, but the general character of the bird is not that of the 

 1 Rough-legged Buzzard' of Northern regions. 



B, pygmceus } nobis. This is the smallest species of true Buzzard 

 with which I am acquainted. Length eighteen inches, or perhaps 

 rather more ; of wing thirteen inches, and tail eight inches : bill to 

 forehead (including cere) fifteen-sixteenths of an inch in a straight 

 line, and an inch and a quarter from point of upper mandible to 

 gape : tarse two inches, and feathered for nearly its upper third. Colour 

 of the beak blackish, the cere and base of both mandibles appearing 

 to have been yellow : legs and toes also yellowish, and talons black. 

 General hue of the upper parts uniform hair- brown, the scapularies 

 and coverts slightly tipped with rufous-white : nape white, tipped with 

 brown, and slightly edged laterally with rufous, which colour increases 

 on the sides of the neck and tinges the wings, the greater feathers 



