Raptores of South America. 349 
abundant in all the countries;of the southern continent. The kites (sub- 
genus Nauclerut, Vigors, and Elanus, Sauvigny,) are from America 
and Africa ; those of the first sub -genus, at least the Nauclerusfur- 
catus, Vig. hovers for whole days over the surface of lakes and 
marshes. The buzzards (Buleo) are also common to the two worlds ; 
but we believe them to be much more numerous in America than in 
Europe, and even than in Africa, the greater extent of marshes and 
plains, occasionally tufted with woods, being highly favourable to 
their mode of life. They are found in all latitudes, from Patago- 
nia to the equator, and from the level of the sea to a very great height 
on the Andes. The same thing may be said of the harriers (Circus) 
which, pretty nearly allied by their manners, are likewise widely 
diffused in America, but occur only in woody plains. 
The Falconidse inhabit both continents, but are much less nume- 
rous in species in the new than in the old world. They are migra- 
tory birds, not more fierce than our European kestril, but extreme- 
ly well adapted for the chase. After the conquest, they were em- 
ployed for hunting tinamous ; and it is not long since they were used 
in Peru and Bolivia for the same purpose. 
The nocturnal birds of prey, or Strixidae, included in ihe Linnean 
genus Strix, which have with propriety been formed into a tribe dis- 
tinct from the other rapacious birds, are equally spread over both 
continents. Such relations exist between the European owl (Strix 
flammea) and its analogue in America, that it would be difficult to 
say exactly whether these species are not identical. The American 
owls are equally fitted with those of Europe to inspire alarm in the 
timid. They live in inhabited places, in old houses or churches, and 
among rocks in the deserts, occupying all latitudes and elevations. 
The barred Eagle-owl (St. Virginiana, Gm. ?) is found only in the 
forests of the temperate regions of South America, under all latitudes, 
representing our large Eagle-owl, (Bubo maximus, Sibb.) of France. 
The " Cheveches"* (Noctua, Savig.) which abound on both conti- 
nents, occur in like manner under the most different latitudes, and 
from the shore of the sea to 17,000 French feet above it. All these 
are noisy birds, and they impart an additional gloom by their melan- 
choly accents, to the vast solitudes which everywhere surround the 
traveller in South America. There are two species which never ap- 
proach wooded places, but alight in the immense savannahs, or the 
arid summits of mountains, and one of them occasionally lurks in 
the burrows formed by mammiferous animals.t Scops belongs to 
the warm and temperate regions of the two continents. 
* " Le type du genre Cheveche est le Strix Nyctea, Gm." Less. Mon. d'Orn. 
i. 100. 
f Perhaps the Ulula cunicularia, Feuill. 
