Page:The Common Birds of Bombay.djvu/36

20 fear it, but they will not risk being surprised among the grass. I am afraid that with the ordinary Bombay sportsman the Marsh Harrier generally passes for a Kite; but it is a smaller and altogether flimsier bird, and is also distinctly darker in colour. Besides, the top of its head is usually white. Young birds, however, want this mark: they are dark-brown all over. In old age, again, the Marsh Harrier assumes a very handsome dress, in which nobody would recognise it for the same bird without an introduction. The shoulders, part of the wings, and the tail, are then of a fine, silvery, grey colour, and the rest is dark-brown, except the head, throat and breast, which are light-reddish. Birds in this plumage are rare, but once in a year or so I meet one. I well remember how the first puzzled me. Like its cousins, the Marsh Harrier is a winter visitant to this country, and in times now almost ancient, when the Flats were inundated every monsoon and did not dry for months after, it was very fond of Bombay. Things are changing sadly, but from Mahaluxmee station northwards and westwards there is still ground on which it can find a living.