﻿290 ON THE CLASSIFICATION OP BIRDS. 



festooned or sinuated on the margin ; while the wings, 

 although rounded like those of the hawks, are consider- 

 ably longer. Greater precision, however, will result from 

 characterising each division of this aberrant circle sepa- 

 rately. The eagles form the ge- 

 nus Aquila (fig. 94.), and are 

 known by having the longest bills 

 of the whole family. Their form 

 is heavy, their size large, their 

 feet short and thick, and their 

 wings only of very moderate 

 length. Following these are the 

 buzzards — the genus Buteo — 

 where the body and legs are 

 slender, the ears large, the bill 

 short and weak, and the wings 

 uncommonly long. To the birds 

 of the third and last division 

 of the aberrant groups we shall retain the English name 

 of Kites. They differ very little from the buzzards, 

 excepting in one very remarkable particular — the ex- 

 treme shortness of their tarsi, — a character, however, 

 so obvious, that it renders the birds of this genus more 

 easy of determination than almost any of the entire 

 family. The type of this group, now first characterised, 

 is the genus Cymindis ; for the common European kite, 

 Milvus ictinus (Savigny), does not, according to our 

 views, strictly belong to the group, but merely forms a 

 passage to it from the buzzards. This error, as we 

 conceive, in overlooking the true distinction of one of 

 the great divisions of this family, has, in all probability, 

 resulted from examining prints and descriptions instead 

 of actual specimens. 



(240.) We shall not, in this stage of our exposition, 

 attempt to prove that the above divisions form a circular 

 series, because this could not be done without anticipating 

 those details which will be stated in their proper place. 

 Nor is this altogether necessary. All ornithologists 

 agree in placing the hawks next in rank to the owls, 



