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Show 1876.] RAPTORIAL BIRDS OF INDIA. 313 and upper tail-coverts of the vast majority of them by the time they arrive in this country get bleached to a dirty white, leaving only traces of the salmon-colour above referred to. In the present example the underparts are of a uniform dark brown colour ; i. e. there is no indication of the stone-coloured blotches I have before referred tof ; but this, I think, is due to individual variation, and I attach no importance whatsoever to the absence of this peculiarity in a solitary specimen. It will thus be seen that Dresser's larger figure (' Birds of Europe,' part xxxiii.) represents a bird in nestling plumage, after the buff bands have faded considerably. H o w long it remains in this bifas-ciated plumage can only be ascertained by keeping one in captivity; but it is as well to repeat! that the assumption of the fully adult dress is attained by the gradual disappearance of the wing-bands (these at first are buff or salmon-coloured, and then white) and the markings on the under surface (when present), after which it presents a uniform brown throughout, with the addition (in the course of time) of a fulvous nuchal patch, which is the sign of a fully matured bird. The growth, however, of this patch is far from regular, and few specimens are procured having it fully developed ; at times it is confined to the top of the head, at others to the nape of the neck in a crescentic or half-moon shape. 27. AQUILA MOGILNIK, G. Gmel. Having now seen the nestling of A. bifasciata and A. hastata, I feel confident, for analogous reasons, that the Aden-killed A. mogilnik in the lineated stage § was also in nestling or fi»*st plumage. Tliis specimen was of a much richer tone throughout than the birds usually procured in this country, the fact being that the sun had not as yet affected the original tint of its plumage. *40. PANDION HALIAETUS, Linn. 1 lost a wounded Osprey on the 24th November last at a jheel in this district, which caused me not a little regret, the more so as I toiled after the bird up to my knees in water, first for some four hours in the morning, and again in the afternoon. It was very wild, keeping to the middle of a large open piece of water, and invariably settling on a decayed stump of a babool tree, where there was no approach of any sort. The place swarmed with larger Eagles, of sorts which never allowed the stranger to have a moment's rest, and were continually depriving it of its well-earned prey. Mr. Cockburn, Curator of the Allahabad Museum, has lately given me a fine mature female which he shot in that district, where, he says, it is far from uncommon. In the well-watered parts of Northern Oudh and Eastern Bengal it is much more common ; but the majority of the jheels in the Doab are too shallow as well as too weedy to attract this purely fish-eating Eagle. t Cf. P. Z. S. 1875, p. 21. \ Cf. P. Z. S. 1872, p. 622. | Cf. P. Z. S. 1875, p. 21. |
