Montagu's harrier. 101 



RAPTORES. FALCONIDM. 



PLATE XX. 



MONTAGU'S HARRIER. 



Circus Montagui. (Yarrell.) 



In size, general appearance, and habits this species so 

 much resembles the Hen Harrier, the subject of the preceding 

 plate, that the circumstance of the one having so long re- 

 mained undistinguished from the other is hardly a subject 

 of surprise ; and credit is the more due to the acute observa- 

 tion of our before-mentioned countryman, Montagu, for dis- 

 criminating between them. The differences are, however, 

 when pointed out, sufficiently obvious, and such as will en- 

 able an observer acquainted with the subject to decide readily 

 to which species any specimen he meets with should be re- 

 ferred. The differences consist in relative proportions and 

 in weight, as much as in the colours of the plumage ; and 

 it may be observed, on referring to the dimensions specified 

 of the males of the two species, that, although Montagu's 

 Harrier is smaller than the Hen Harrier in all other measure- 

 ments, it equals that species in the length of the tarsus, and 

 exceeds it in the expanse of the wing. The first notice of 

 this bird was published by Montagu in the Linnsean Trans- 

 actions, and was the description of one killed in the summer 

 of 1803. In May, 1808, the same author says, " We ob- 

 served one of these birds in South Devon, skimming over 

 a patch of furze very near, and noticed that it repeatedly 

 dropped into the same spot, after having pitched on the bare 



