134

134

^{General Notea. [Januai-y}

valexists. Thislatterisspanned over in the living bird by a delicate band of fibrous tissue. In tlie genus Buteo a similar state of affairs obtains, andIpresent aboveadrawing of thepelvisof aspecimen of B.

borealiscalicrus. oflFering an aspectfromwhichthe pointIrefer to,

maj

beseen. This figurehappensto betaken from a skeleton of ^tiiis bird, which Ihaverecentlyforwardedtothe

Museum

oftheUniversity ofEdin- buigli.

Some

of therepresentatiA-esof the genus Falco have the post- pubisall in one piece, as

we

find it in the vast majority ofthe class, though a tliinningof itsmiddlepoition

may

usually bedetected.

In the figure ofaskeleton ofan Eagle presented by Mr. Y. JeftVey Bell (after Milne-Edwards), in his 'Comparative

Anatomy

and Physiology,' onlythatportion of the post-pubis is

shown

which closes the obturator foramen. Thisisequallytrueof SirRichard Owen's figure of the pelvis of one of these birds in his

'Anatomy

of Vertebrates' (Vol. II, p. 33, fig.23).

Qj-iiteoften ithappensthat the obturator foramen is closed in bv the ligamentous band whichconnects thefree extreniitx-ofthis anterior por- tionf)f the post-pubic element {op') with the ischium. Indeed, the last

named

authoralludesto this, andsays that -'theshoi"test pubis isseenin certain Eagles,in which itterminatesafter forming the lower boundary of theobturatorforamen; itsextremity there projecting freely,as in fig.

23, d, orbeingjoinedby ligamenttothe ischium, as in the

Harpy

Eagle, inwhichitisan inchin length, whilstthe ilium is six inches long" {op.

fit., p. 36).

Unfortunately,I

happen

nottohavethe skeleton of an Eagle at hand, butitseemsto me,in viewof the fact that the genera ofBuzzards and Eaglesare quite closely afiined, the latter birds should possess this free portion ofthe post-pubicelementof the pelvis also.

As

it is often de- tachedduring maceration, it is quite possible that in the course ofthe preparation of the specimens from which M. Milne-Edwards and Sir Richard Owen's figuresweretaken, itma^- have beenlost.

As

Eagles arequite

common

in thisvicinit\', Ihope tobe abletodecide this point,on

some

futureoccasion,bvdissectionof a fresh specimen.

—

R.

W. Shufeldt,

Fort Wingate.Nez{.'Mexico. Sth Nov. 1SS5.

Capture of the Scissor-tailed Flycatcher {Milz'teliis forfica/na) on the Southeast Coast ofFlorida.

— Oh

the 2d ofMarch, 1SS5. I shot one of these birds, amale,at

Cape

Sable^the only onenoticed. Ithinkitsoccur- renceso far eastworthyof note.

—

N. S. Goss. Topekci, Kciiisas.

The

Scissor-tailedFlycatcher {.\f/lz>ulits forftcatiis)at

Key

West.

—

^{In a}

collectionofalcoholicspecimensofbirds

made

at

Key

West, Florida,Jan- uary 15, 1885,bythe naturalistsofthe U. S. Fish

Commission

Steamer 'Albatross' is a specimen ofthis species (U. S.Nat. Mus. No. 102,444).

The

record should havebeen

made

beforethis, butIhadquite forgotten thematteruntilremindedof itbythe above noteby Col Goss.

—

Robert

RiDGWAY,

Washing-ton, D. C.