THE BUZZARD-EAGLES. 
153 
long typically to the Eagles. The connection between them 
and the Buzzards is very close, while by way of the Kites they 
also approach the Falcons. 
Among the Eagles are to be found the largest of the Birds 
of Prey, such as the Laemmergeier, or “Bearded Vulture” as 
it is often called, a bird which, though structurally an Eagle, 
much resembles the Scavenger Vultures in many of its habits. 
It resembles the latter in being bare-footed, whereas all the 
species of the true Aquila and its allied genera have feathered 
tarsi. In this feathered group are included all the beautiful 
Crested Eagles {Spiza'ctus) and the Hawk -Eagles (Eutobua'ctus), 
as well as the curious Egg-devourer {Neopus). 
The bare-footed section comprises all the Sea-Eagles {Halia 'c- 
tus) and the Snake-Eagles {Circaitus), besides a number of tro- 
pical forms, such as Haliastiir, which is half a Kite and half a 
Sea-Eagle, and connects the latter with the true Kites. 
THE BUZZARD-EAGLES. GENUS ARCIIIBUTEO. 
Archibuteo, Brehm, Isis, 1828, p. 1269. 
Type, A. lagopus (J. F. Gmclin). 
These birds have always been considered to be true Buzzards, 
and have generally been placed by ornithologists either in the 
genus Buteo or in close proximity, but the reticulation of the 
tarsi shows that they really belong to the Aquilince. In writing 
the “Catalogue of Birds in the British Museum,” I made the 
curious mistake of figuring the tarsus of Archibuteo to show 
that it was reticulated behind, and then placed the genus 
among the Buzzards, thus stultifying the arrangement I had 
been at great pains to emphasise — just one of those annoying 
faux pas which one makes sometimes without any apparent 
reason. Mr. Seebohm discovered ray mistake and went so far 
as to put the Rough-legged Buzzards into the genus Aquila, 
because Dr. Gadow had found resemblances in the anatomy of 
the above-mentioned species and the Spotted Eagle. To put 
these two birds into the same genus is, however, more than Dr. 
Gadow ever intended, and although the Buzzard-Eagles bear a 
very close resemblance to the True Eagles, the nostril is not ex- 
posed as in the latter birds, and is, moreover, vertical, with an 
