Rocke stated that the species bred every year in Inverness,
whence Lord Hill had several times received the young, hut
finding it impossible to rear them, he had requested that in
future they might not be disturbed. About this time also
information reached Mr. Joseph Wolf, the accomplished
zoological artist, that a second spot in another quarter was
still tenanted; and lately Mr. Robert Gray lias announced
that in 1867 there were three or four strictly protected
breeding stations in Ross-sliire, and that he has authority
for believing that one in the south-west of the kingdom is
yet used. I t thus appears that there is still a sufficient
number left to stock the whole of Scotland, and it may be
hoped that the efforts of those who are anxious for this
species to retain its rank as a native of our island will meet
with success.
In Ireland, in the Hebrides, Orkneys, and Slietlands, the
Osprey seems to have never occurred but as an accidental
stranger. I t does not visit either Iceland or Greenland, but
there are comparatively few parts of the globe in which it
is not found; for, though many ornithologists have described
the “ Fish-Hawks ” of America and Australia as distinct,
under the names respectively of Pandion carolinensis and
P. leucocephalus, Professor Schlegel and Mr. Gurney have
recorded their opinion (in which they have been followed by
authorities so high as Drs. Hartlaub and Finscli), that there
is hut one and the same species all the world over, and on
this view it seems that the Osprey is the most cosmopolitan
of the hirds-of-prey. I t is abundant throughout North
America southward, from lat. 60°, and breeds on the Cays
of Honduras; it yearly visits the West Indies, and is
recorded from Brazil by Prince Max and Natterer—the
last of whom met with it so far in the interior as the
middle of the province of Mato Grosso. Mr. Gurney
considers examples from the Atlantic side of the continent
to be larger than those from elsewhere, and adds, that
one of the smallest he has seen is from Nootka Sound. It
occurs in some only of the islands of the Pacific (the Isle of
Pines and the Exchequer group, for example), and not at all
in New Zealand ; but in Tasmania Mr. Gould says he himself
shot it in Recherche Bay, at the extreme south of that
island, though, in his opinion, the bird which is found there and
in Australia is specifically distinct—the P. leucocephalus just
mentioned. He further states that Mr. Gilbert discovered
it breeding at Swan River and at Port Essington. Thence
it extends northward to New Guinea, where that enterprising
and philosophical naturalist Mr. Wallace obtained it, and to
most if not all of the islands of the Malay and Indian Archipelagos—
Ceram, Celebes, Borneo, and Java. I t has not been
recorded from the Philippines, but Mr. Swinlioe says it is
abundant in Formosa, and it is met with in Japan. So far
as our knowledge is at all complete, it extends throughout the
continent of Asia, and in India it is spread, according to
Mr. Jerdon, all over the country, and breeds there. It is also
generally dispersed throughout Africa, from Natal northwards,
along both east and west coasts, and the course of
the larger rivers. Dr. von Heuglin found it breeding on the
Dalialak islets in the Red Sea. Returning to Europe, it occupies
every suitable station from Greece and Spain, where it
breeds—sometimes on sea-cliffs, as at Gibraltar,—to Lapland.
The Osprey measures about twenty-two inches in length.
The beak is black, the cere blue, the irides yellow; the
top of the head and nape of the neck whitish, streaked with
dark brown, the feathers elongated. The upper surface of
the body and wings dark brown, often with a purple gloss;
the ends of the primaries black; the upper surface of the
tail waved with two shades of brown ; the chin and throat
white; across the upper part of the breast a light brown
band. The belly, thighs, and under tail-coverts, white;
under surface of the wing white at the axilla, brown on the
outer edge; under surface of the primaries dark brown, the
shafts white; under surface of the tail barred with greyish-
brown on a white ground : the legs and toes blue ; the toes
partly reticulated, but with a few broad scales near the end,
their under surface covered with short, sharp spines: claws
long, all of nearly uniform length, and solid,—that is, not
grooved underneath ; their colour black.