habits of the bird, the word ‘ kite ’ was often used as a term of reproach. For example : — ‘ You kite ’ 
(Anthony and Cleopatra, Act III. Scene 2) ; and ‘ Detested kite ’ (King Lear, Act I. Scene 4). 
“The intractable disposition of the bird is thus noticed in the ‘ Taming of the Shrew,’ Act IV. Scene 1: — 
* * “ Watch her as we watch these kites 
That bate and beat and will not be obedient. 
“ Another curious fact in its natural history is adverted to in the ‘Winter’s Tale’ (Act IV. Scene 2), 
where it is said : — ‘ When the kite builds look to lesser linen.' 
“Tills line may perhaps be best illustrated by a description of a Kite’s nest taken in Huntingdonshire, 
and still in the possession of a friend at Newcastle. The outside is composed of strong sticks ; the 
lining of small pieces of linen, part of a saddle-girth, a bit of a harvest-glove, part of a straw bonnet, pieces 
of paper, and a ivorsted garter ; and in the midst of this singular collection of materials were deposited two 
eggs.” 
The Rev. H. B. Tristram, speaking, in his work entitled ‘ The Gi’eat Sahara,’ of the habits of the Egyptian 
Kite {JMilvus yddgyptius'), says : — “ Its nest, the marine-store-shop of the desert, is decorated with whatever 
scraps of boiirnouses and coloured rags can be collected; and to these are added on every surrounding branch 
the cast-olf coats of serpents, large scraps of thin bark, and perhaps a Bustard’s wing.” — ‘Zoologist,’ 1866, 
p. 409 et seq. In olden times the Kite M'as not only around and in the metropolis, but the citizens 
could not take a jaunt to Highgate or Epping Forest without witnessing its charming aerial flight and 
circling evolutions between them and the azure sky, a sight that would gladden the eyes of every naturalist, 
but Avhich is not now to be seen. Of course in the great forests and large clumps of trees in every English 
county the bird was equally numerous, and not less so in most parts of Scotland, Wales, and Ireland ; sanitary 
science, the clearance of woods and forests, extended cultivation, and the preservation of game have, however, 
so thinned its numbers that it is almost extirpated. From the moment these measures commenced, the fate 
of the bird was sealed ; and were I to affirm that now, in 1868, there are not five pairs of Kites in the 
British Islands, I should scarcely exceed the chances of probability ; and where to look for a breeding pair, 
either in the New Forest or in any part of the Highlands, Wales, Scotland, or Ireland, I know not : but that 
the bird still clings to some of its old haunts is certain ; for Mr. Henry Nicholls,jun., records in the ‘Zoologist’ 
for 1863 the shooting of a fine old male on the banks of the Avon, near Kingsbridge, in Devonshire, on the 
13th of October, 1862 ; and in a communication to the same volume, p. 8441, by W. Christy Horsfall, Esq., 
dated Horsforth Low Hall, near Leeds, Jan. 2, 1863, that gentleman says, “ We have had a Kite in the 
woods here for the last eighteen months. I gave orders that it should not be molested, in the hope it 
would find a mate ; but although it is still about, it has not yet met with one.” 
Montagu, when he wrote, had seen but one in Devonshire in twelve years ; and Mr. Couch mentions two 
instances of its appearance in Cornwall. Waterton has noticed the bird and its habits in Yorkshire ; and 
Selby stated forty years ago that, “ though rare in Northumberland and Durbam, it is more frequent in 
Westmoreland and Cumberland. Dr. Heysham says that the Kite bred about tbe same period in the woods 
near Armathwaite, and also in those near Ullswater.” In the interv^al that has elapsed, all this has become 
changed, and Lincolnshire is the last part of the eastern portion of England in which it has bred ; several 
instances are mentioned in Professor Newton’s ‘ Ootheca M^olleyana,’ to which my readers are referred. 
The persecution to which the bird has been sidijected in Britain has been less relentlessly carried out on 
the continent of Europe ; and in North Africa and many other countries it still holds its own. Lord 
Lilford observed it to be rather abundant in Acarnania, and states that it is very common and a constant 
resident in Sicily and Calabria. It is not found so far to the eastward as India, its place there being 
occupied by the Milvus govinda. Species of the same form inhabit China, Japan, Africa, and Australia; but, 
so far as I am aware, no true Kite (flilvus') occurs in Polynesia or America. 
To this short history of our Kite I may add that it is the finest species of its genus, that the sexes are 
very similar in colour, that it usually builds its nest on the fork of a large tree, of sticks, lined with dry 
grass, wool, and other soft materials, and lays two, and sometimes three eggs, which are subject to much 
diversity of colouring : they are of a short oval form, measuring two inches and two lines in length by one 
inch and nine lines in breadth ; of a dull white hue, marked with a few reddish spots over the larger end. 
Mr. Hewltson mentions one that was closely covered all over with light rufous blotches, and another with 
beautiful tints of lilac and purple relieved with brown. 
The plate represents a male about two-thirds of the size of life, from a beautiful sketch made for this 
work by Mr. B olf. 
