Ridgway on a Tropical American Hawk . 
21 1 
Adult $ ( Palatha , Florida , February i, 1881 ; G. A. Boardman ) : Upper 
surface continuous and nearly uniform blackish-brown, darkest and most 
uniform on the head, which, with the exception of the anterior half of 
the lores, the anterior malar region, chin, and throat, is solid sooty black, 
the occipital feathers snow-white beneath the surface ; back with a strong 
chalky or glaucous cast in certain lights, the scapulars and wings dull 
grayish-brown with the feathers darker centrally ; ' sides of the rump 
strongly tinged with rufous. Tail grayish-brown, very narrowly tipped 
with dull white, and crossed near the end by an indistinct band of dusky, 
and showing, when widely spread, indications of about four other narrow 
broken bands, in the form of irregular, but mostly somewhat V-shaped, 
bars of black along the middle poi'tion of the feathers. Lateral upper 
tail-coverts lighter brownish-gray, with broad but rather indistinct bars or 
spots of dusky. A spot on each side of the base of the bill, covering the 
anterior half of the loral and malar regions, chin, throat, middle of the 
jugulum, breast, and remaining lower parts, immaculate pure white, the 
tibiae, especially on their inner side, washed with pale ochraceous or 
light buff. Sides of the jugulum rufous-brown, the feathers with dusky 
shaft-streaks; sides of the breast and anterior portion of the sides marked 
with a few dusky shaft-streaks, the more posterior ones of which expand 
terminally into a broad streak of dusky brown. Lining of the wing and 
axillars immaculate pure white, the under primary-coverts, however, with 
a large patch of dusky near the end. Bill black, bluish basally ; cere, 
legs, and feet, yellow; iris, brown. Wing, 12.00; tail, 7.00; culmen, .75; 
tarsus, 2.10; middle toe, 1.35. 
Adult $ (?) : Similar to the $ , but without rufous tinge on sides of 
breast, which are grayish-brown, similar to, but lighter than, the wing- 
coverts. Size larger (wing about 12.70). 
Toung : “ Very similar to the adult, but browner above, the feathers 
being margined with fulvous ; the crown and sides of face streaked with 
pale ochre; the under surface, especially the under wing-coverts, washed 
with ochre.” ( Sharpe , l.c .) 
An adult specimen (sex not indicated) from Mirador, Eastern 
Mexico (No. 23,887, U. S. Nat. Mus.), is much like the Florida 
example described above, but has the white loral spaces larger 
and connected across the anterior part of the forehead, the sides 
of the breast almost entirely rufous (there being little if any of 
the grayish-brown) and the dusky shaft-streaks more distinct. 
The upper portion of the flanks, adjoining the sides of the rump, 
are also more distinctly and more extensively rufous. The 3rd 
quill, instead of the 4th, is longest, the wing-formula being 
3, 4, 5-2, 6-7-8, 1. Wing, 11.25; tail, 7.20; culmen, .75; 
tarsus, 2.05; middle toe, 1.40. 
