336 THE PURRE. 



along the sand, the small pigeon-hawk, constrained by 

 necessity, ventures to make a sweep among the dead in 

 presence of the proprietor, but as suddenly pays for his 

 temerity with his life. Such a tyrant is man, when vested 

 with power, and unrestrained by the dread of responsibility ! 



The purre is eight inches in length, and fifteen inches in 

 extent; the bill is black, straight, or slightly bent downwards, 

 about an inch and a half long, very thick at the base, and 

 tapering to a slender blunt point at the extremity ; eye, very 

 small ; iris, dark hazel ; cheeks, gray ; line over the eye, belly, 

 and vent, white ; back and scapulars, of an ashy brown, 

 marked here and there with spots of black, bordered with 

 bright ferruginous ; sides of the rump, white ; tail-coverts, 

 olive, centred with black; chin, white; neck below, gray; 

 breast and sides, thinly marked with pale spots of dusky, in 

 some pure white ; wings, black, edged and tipt with white ; 

 two middle tail-feathers, dusky, the rest, brown ash, edged 

 with white ; legs and feet, black ; toes, bordered with a very 

 narrow scalloped membrane. The usual broad band of white 

 crossing the wing forms a distinguishing characteristic of 

 almost the whole genus. 



On examining more than a hundred of these birds, they 

 varied considerably in the black and ferruginous spots on the 

 back and scapulars ; some were altogether plain, while others 

 were thickly marked, particularly on the scapulars, with a red 

 rust colour, centred with black. The females were uniformly 

 more plain than the males ; but many of the latter, probably 

 young birds, were destitute of the ferruginous spots. On the 

 24th of May, the eggs in the females were about the size of 

 partridge-shot. In what particular regions of the north these 

 birds breed is altogether unknown. 



