38 Mr. H. Durnford on some Birds observed 
Noctua cunicularia. 
Common. Nesting in holes in the ground. 
Circus cinereus. 
Common in the valley, not seen on the hills. In flight it 
is very quick and graceful: few birds are a match for this 
Harrier; and as it sweeps rapidly over the ground, now scarcely 
clearing the tops of the high grass, and the next minute 
rising to drop on some luckless victim, it is impossible not to 
admire its great strength of wing. The stomach of one shot 
on the 24th November contained the remains of a freshly 
killed Thinocorus rumicivorus. To the colonist it is well 
known; and more than one person assured me it nested on 
the ground amongst long grass, and laid two white eggs; my 
search, however, for the nest was unsuccessful. Legs, feet, 
and irides pale orange. 
Geranoaetus melanoleucus. 
Not uncommon, especially in the upper part of the valley. 
On the 9th November I shot a female from the nest, on a 
ledge high up in a Tosca cliff, thirteen miles north-west of 
the town, and after considerable difficulty secured the two 
eggs, which are of a dirty white colour, very slightly speckled 
with brown, and measure 2’6 inches by 2. As they con¬ 
tained chicks about to be released from their prisons, I con¬ 
clude two is the number of eggs usually laid. On a subse¬ 
quent visit to the same cliff, and also to one in its immediate 
neighbourhood, which, from its peculiar shape, the colonists 
have named the old castle/' I found several nests of pre¬ 
vious years, all of the same character, viz. a structure of sticks 
some three feet in diameter and fifteen inches in depth, the 
inside being lined with a few straws. 
Buteo erythronotus. 
Not uncommon on the hills, but very shy. Whilst riding 
on the I8th November from Ninfas Point, and about seven 
miles from the colony, I found a nest on the top of a bush, 
some nine feet from the ground, containing two chicks, ap¬ 
parently about a fortnight old. The nest was a large struc¬ 
ture of sticks, lined with a variety of materials—-bits of skin 
