8 
FALCO COOPERII. 
the back, with almost always a few broad bands of 
black, and sometimes of white, and a whitish tip. 
The hawks ( Asiures ) combine cunning' with agility 
and strength. Sudden and impetuous in their movements, 
they make great havoc, especially among birds that 
keep in flocks, as pigeons, blackbirds, &c. and are the 
terror of the poultry yard. Fearless and sanguinary, 
they never feed, even when pressed by hunger, except 
on red and warm-blooded animals, whose quivering 
limbs they tear with savage delight. Birds they pluck 
very carefully, and quarter, before eating them, but 
swallow small quadrupeds entire, afterwards ejecting 
their skins rolled up into a ball. They always pursue 
and seize their prey upon the wing, not falling upon it 
from aloft, but, rapidly skimming the earth, make their 
insidious approaches sidewise, and, singling out their 
victim, dart upon it with fatal velocity. They never 
soar, like the kites and eagles, to the upper regions of 
the atmosphere; and it is only during the nuptial 
season that they are observed sailing in wide circles in 
the air. Their favourite haunts, during summer, are 
forests, building their nests on trees; in winter they 
spread over the plains. Though generally observed 
alone, the male and his companion are seldom far apart. 
During the youth of their progeny, the parents keep 
them company, in order to teach them to hunt their 
prey, and at such times they are observed in families. 
This group may be farther subdivided into two 
sections, to one of which the name of Astur has more 
strictly been assigned, while the other has been distin- 
guished by those of Sparvius and Accipiter. The 
former, of which the goshawk of Europe and North 
America (black-capped hawk of Wilson) is the type, is 
characterized by its wings being somewhat longer, 
body more robust, and shorter, and much thicker tarsi. 
This is the only species that inhabits the United States 
and Europe. 
The second section, to which the present new species 
belongs, possessing all its characters in a pre-eminent 
degree, equally with the hawk described by Wilson in 
