66 
FALCO PENNSYLVANICUS. 
same species, sailing about over the same woods. Its 
motions were in wide circles, with unmoving wings, 
the exterior outline of which seemed a complete semi- 
circle. I was extremely anxious to procure this also, if 
possible; but it was attacked and driven away by a 
king-bird before I could effect my purpose, and I have 
never since been fortunate enough to meet with another. 
On dissection, the one I had shot proved to be a male. 
In size this hawk agrees, nearly, with the buzzardet , 
( falco albidus , ) of Turton, described also by Pennant;^ 
but either the descriptions of these authors are very 
inaccurate, the change of colour which that bird under- 
goes very great, or the present is altogether a different 
species. Until, however, some other specimens of this 
hawk come under my observation, I can only add the 
following particulars of its size and plumage : — 
Length, fourteen inches ; extent, thirty-three inches ; 
bill, black, blue near the base, slightly toothed ; cere and 
corners of the mouth, yellow ; irides, bright amber ; 
frontlet and lores, white ; from the mouth backwards 
runs a streak of blackish brown ; upper parts, dark 
brown, the plumage tipt and the head streaked with 
whitish ; almost all the feathers above are spotted or 
barred with white, but this is not seen unless they be 
separated by the hand ; head, large, broad, and hat ; cere 
very broad; the nostril also large; tail short, the exterior 
and interior feathers somewhat the shortest, the others 
rather longer, of a full black, and crossed with two bars 
of white, tipt also slightly with whitish ; tail coverts, 
spotted with white ; wings, dusky brown, indistinctly 
barred with black; greater part of the inner vanes, 
snowy ; lesser coverts, and upper part of the back, tipt 
and streaked with bright ferruginous ; the bars of black 
are very distinct on the lower side of the wing ; lining 
of the wing, brownish white, beautifully marked with 
small arrow-heads of brown ; chin, white, surrounded 
by streaks of black ; breast and sides, elegantly spotted 
with large arrow-heads of brown centered with pale 
* Arct. Zool, No. 109 . 
