AMERICAN BUZZARD. 
85 
his eyes, as if quite passive. Though he lived so long 
without food, he was found on dissection to be exceed- 
ingly fat, his stomach being enveloped in a mass of 
solid fat of nearly an inch in thickness. 
The white-breasted hawk is twenty-two inches long, 
and four feet in extent ; cere, pale green ; bill, pale 
blue, black at the point ; eye, bright straw colour ; 
eyebrow, projecting greatly ; head, broad, flat, and large ; 
upper part of the head, sides of the neck and back, 
brown, streaked and seamed with white and some pale 
rust ; scapulars and wing-coverts spotted with white ; 
wing quills much resembling the preceding species ; 
tail coverts, white, handsomely barred with brown ; tail, 
slightely rounded, of a pale brown colour, varying in 
some to a sorrel, crossed by nine or ten bars of black, 
and tipt for half an inch with white ; wings, brown, 
barred with dusky ; inner vanes nearly all white ; chin, 
throat, and breast, pure white, with the exception of 
some slight touches of brown that enclose the chin ; 
femorals, yellowish white, thinly marked with minute 
touches of rust ; legs, bright yellow, feathered half way 
down ; belly, broadly spotted with black or very deep 
brown; the tips of the wings reach to the middle of 
the tail. 
My reasons for inclining to consider this a distinct 
species from the last, is that of having uniformly found 
the present two or three inches larger than the former, 
though this may possibly be owing to their greater 
age. 
SUBGENUS IX. — CIRCUS , BECHSTEIN. 
22 . FALCO HYEMALIS , WILSON. — WINTER FALCON. 
WILSON, PL. XXXV. FIG. I ADULT MALE. 
This elegant and spirited hawk visits us from the 
north early in November, and leaves us late in March. 
