SPOTTED EAGLE AT ELMSTEAD AND LEIGH. 219
weak from want of food, and was very light. A gale from the N.E.
had been blowing for two days, so I imagine that the bird had been
carried out of its course. I find that it had been seen two or three
days before I shot it."—W. Cole.
[We, of course, give the names of the species on the authority of
Dr. Laver and Mr. King. The Spotted Eagle appears to be one of
our rarest birds, only six examples having been previously recorded
in Great Britain and Ireland (viz., two near Youghal in 1845 ; two
in Cornwall in 1861 ; one in Lancashire in 1874 ; and one, in 1885,
in Northumberland). Its distribution is thus summarised by Mr.
Saunders: —" It is probable that the specific name generally
employed was originally intended for the small form which breeds
in the forests of Northern Germany, and becomes numerous in
Pomerania and the Baltic provinces of Russia ; though rare on
the eastern side of the Gulf of Bothnia, and only a straggler to
Sweden and Lapland. Southward this can be traced through
Poland and the marshy woods to the west of the Dnieper down
to Bessarabia, as well as to the Caucasus. A larger form, which
slightly intrudes on this area, occupies the forest region to the
eastward and southward as far as the steppes; beyond which it
extends across Turkestan and Central Asia to Northern China,
and to some parts of India, Persia, and Asia Minor. It nests
in Turkey, the districts watered by and south of the Danube, and
suitable localities in Italy and the islands of the Mediterranean;
also, sparingly, in north Africa. In the south of Spain it is not
common; but I frequently saw and heard it in the Pyrenees.
In France and Belgium it is rare, except on the wooded south-
eastern frontier towards Switzerland and Luxemburg. In winter
both races migrate entirely from their northern, and partially from
their southern, haunts in Europe, numbers ascending the Nile
valley to Abyssinia." The late severe storms were doubtless the
cause of these distinguished visitors' presence in Essex. Possibly they
were blown from their course during migration. It is stated that the
Elmstead specimen is a young male, in good plumage, the wings
extending nearly six feet from point to point. Its appetite is very
keen, it having disposed in three days of a large barn-door fowl, a
rabbit, and the entire pluck of a sheep ! If Dr. Laver is correct
in referring the specimen to the small form, it is probably quite
new to the British fauna, as Mr. J. H. Gurney stated that all the
British examples he had seen were referable to the larger variety,
which, he says, is the A. clanga of Pallas. The Elmstead specimen
forms the subject of a large engraving in the "Daily Graphic" of
November 18th.—Ed.]