SPECIES 8. FALCO BOREALIS. 
RED-TAILED HAWK. 
[Plate LII. — Fig. 1.] 
Arci. Zool. p. 205 , JVo. 100 . — American Buzzard, Lath, i, 50 . — 
Turi'. Sy^t. p. 151 . — F, Aquilinus, cauda ferruginea, Great 
Engle Hawk, Bautram, p. 290 . — Fhale’s Museum, dVo. 182 . 
The figure of this bird, and those of the other two Hawks 
in the same plate, are reduced to exactly half the dimensions of 
the living subjects. These representations are offered to the 
public with a confidence in their fidelity; but these, I am sorry 
to say, are almost all I have to give towards elucidating their 
history. Birds naturally thinly dispersed over a vast extent of 
country, retiring during summer to the depth of the forests to 
breed, approaching the habitations of man, like other thieves 
and plunderers, with shy and cautious jealousy, seldom permit- 
ting a near advance, subject to great changes of plumage, and, 
since the decline of falconry, seldom or never domesticated, offer 
to those who wish eagerly to investigate their history, and to 
delineate their particular character and manners, great and in- 
surmountable difficulties. Little more can be done in such cases 
than to identify the species, and trace it through the various 
quarters of the world, where it has been certainly met with. 
The Red-tailed Hawk is most frequently seen in the lower 
parts of Pennsylvania, during the severity of winter. Among 
the extensive meadows that border the Schuylkill and Delaware, 
below Philadelphia, where flocks of Larks, [Alauda magna) 
and where mice and moles are in great abundance, many indi- 
viduals of this Hawk spend the greater part of the winter. 
Others prowl around the plantations, looking out for vagrant 
chickens; their method of seizing which, is by sweeping swiftly 
over the spot, and grappling them with their talons, bearing 
