Red-tailed Hawk
American Buzzard
Ash-coloured Hawk
These representations are offered to the public with confidence in their fidelity; but these, I am sorry to say, are almost all I have to give towards elucidating their history. Birds, naturally thinly dispersed over a vast extent of the country; retiring during summer to the depth of the forests to breed; approaching he habitations of man like other thieves and plunderers, with shy and cautious jealousy; seldom permitting a near advance; subject to great changes of plumage; and, since the decline of falconry, seldom or never domesticated,--offer to those who wish eagerly to investigate their history, and to delineate their particular character and manners, great and insurmountable difficulties. Little more can be done in such cases than to identify the species, and trace it through the various quarters of the world where it has been certainly met with.
American Buzzard
It is with some doubt and hesitations that I introduce the present as a distinct species from the preceding. In their size and general aspect they resemble each other considerably; yet I have found both males and females among each; and in the present species I have sometimes found the ground colour of the tail strongly tinged with ferruginous, and the bars of dusky but slight; while in the preceding, the tail is sometimes wholly red brown, the single bar of black near the tip excepted; in other specimens evident remains of numerous other bars are visible. In the meantime both are figured, and future observations may throw more light on the matter.
