


366 Mr. J. H. Gurney’s Noles on 
sion, I pass on to the consideration of Buteo desertorum, 
respecting which, however, I have but little to add to my 
remarks in ‘ The Ibis’ for 1862, p. 361. 
In the case of this species, as in that of B. vulgaris, a very 
full article has lately appeared from the pen of Mr. Dresser 
in the ‘ Birds of Europe,’ in which he gives more ample de- 
tails as to the measurements, variations of plumage, and geo- 
graphical range of this Buzzard than can be looked for im 
the briefer summary comprised in Mr. Sharpe’s work. In 
this article Mr. Dresser mentions the fact of his having re- 
ceived a specimen of B. desertorum from the remarkably 
northern locality of Archangel; and since its publication he 
has seen a second example, which was also obtained in that 
vicinity. : 
In Mr. Dresser’s article on B. vulgaris he remarks that 
subsequently to the publication of his account of B. deser- 
torum he had examined the Buzzards obtained by Mr. God-~ 
man in the Azores, and had “ ascertained that they were not, 
as was supposed, B. vulgaris, but B. desertorum”’*. 
Mr. Gould, in the introduction to his magnificent work on 
the birds of Great Britain, refers to a Buzzard of this species 
which was killed at Everley, Wiltshire, in September 1864. 
This specimen Mr. Gould kindly permitted me to examine, 
when it was in his custody, some years since; and there ap- 
peared to me to be no doubt of its being really B. desertorum 
in immature plumage. 
I may add that Mr. Gould, in his remarks upon this species, 
says, “it 1s included by Schlegel in his ‘ Fauna Japonica,’ ” 
which conveys the idea that it had been received from Japan ; 
but this is a misapprehension: the authors of the ‘ Fauna 
Japonica’ give, at page 16 of their volume “ Aves,” a list of 
Buzzards which they consider to be nearly allied to Buteo 
japonicus; and it is merely in this list and as one of these 
species that they mention “la buse commune du Cap... 
espéce que nous désignerons sous le nom de Buteo capensis.” 
Mr. Sharpe states that B. desertorum “gradually gets 
darker with age ;” but having had the opportunity of watch- 
* Conf. Ibis, 1866, p. 94, 

