_Astur_ comprises forty or more members, several of which have exact counterparts in the genus _Accipiter_.[136] The more robust build, shorter legs, and stouter toes serve as distinctions; but it must be noted that short wings, long legs, and bill without a notch mark all Accipitrine as opposed to Falconine forms. The descriptions below will be sufficient to shew the coloration, as the species, except _A. novae hollandiae_, are very similar. Inhabitants of the woodland and river-side, they are nearly cosmopolitan, though absent in parts of the Neotropical Region and in New Zealand; while several islands have peculiar races. _A. palumbarius_, the Goshawk, called of old the "Gentle Falcon," is now seldom observed in Britain, though once it nested in Scotland; it ranges throughout Europe and Asia to Morocco, and thence to the Himalayas and Japan, or slightly further south in winter. It is ashy-brown above, with four dark bands on the white-tipped tail, and is closely barred with brown and white below. Daring and rapacious, with marvellous power of steerage, it follows the abruptest turns of its victims with the greatest ease, gliding after them in a low, persistent style, termed by falconers "raking." The food consists of small mammals and birds, but _A. badius_ and _A. tachiro_ will eat {157}frogs, and the latter limpets; the large flat nest of sticks, rarely lined with roots, is placed in trees, the bluish-white eggs, numbering from three to five, being occasionally marked with rust-colour. The barely separable North American _A. atricapillus_ exhibits very close bars below; the crested _A. trivirgatus_, ranging from India and the Great Sunda Islands to Formosa, is slaty-grey, having a rufous chest, a white throat with black median streak, a tail with four brown bands, and white under parts barred with rufous and brown; _A. badius_, the Shikra, extending in its various sub-species from Central Russia, Servia, and Greece to China, and many parts of Africa, is blue-grey with five or six blackish tail-bands, a less distinct throat-streak, and salmon-coloured lower surface with narrow white cross-bars. _A. trinotatus_ of Celebes is blackish-grey, with lighter head, white spots on the median rectrices, uniform vinous breast, white throat and vent; the young are ferruginous-red above with black markings. Most remarkable of all is _A. novae hollandiae_ of Southern Australia and Tasmania–with its smaller race _A. leucosomus_ of Papuasia and the Cape York district–pure white in colour, with black bill, yellow cere and red irides, which some writers consider a permanent albino of _A. cinereus_. _A. hensti_ and _A. franciscae_ are confined to Madagascar, _A. brutus_ and _A. pusillus_ to Mayotte and Joanna Islands of the Comoros respectively. _Nisoïdes moreli_, also from Madagascar, a bird with stout bill and white irides, closely approaches _Astur_.