320 Whitney's owl — micrathene whitneyt. 



organ-bellows to sounds from the keys of tlie instrument. No wonder 

 tbat in classic times it Avas written of Owls : 



"Est illis sfrifiibits nomeii ; stnl noniiuis liiijiis 

 Cauaa quod Iiorremiri stiidcre uocte soleut ;" 



nor that later and more professedly ornithological observers of nature 

 should have heavily taxed their vocabularies in selection of epithets to 

 express the vocal eccentricities of Owls, not to allude to the liberties 

 that lay writers, whether of prose or verse, have taken, in a supersti- 

 tious, legendary mood, with the weird associations of these " monks 

 who chant midnight mass in the great temple of Nature.'' 



I am inclined to repeat in this connection a liberal proposition, made 

 by one of the most delightful of writers on birds. In his history of the 

 rapacious birds of Great Britain, Mr. Macgillivray quotes a poetic pas- 

 sage respecting Owls, and adds, in his original way, "the reader may 

 here supply a chapter on snperstitions, which the author forgot! " For 

 the Pygmy Owl, unknown to poetic and legendary fame, living to our 

 remembrance only in times when nature is questioned fearlessly, not 

 tremblingly as of old wiien ignorance served all purposes, has never been 

 regarded as of weird, uncanny import. Not a single irrational attribute 

 has attached to it ; nor need it be sought in greater obscurity than the 

 shade of its favorite pines. With little experience of man, it has had 

 no opportunity of gaining that sort of wisdom credibly supposed to flow 

 from such contact; still less has it the supernatural lore attributed to 

 the bird of Minerva. It is a very straightforward, ingenious, unsus- 

 picious little bird, meddling with no affairs but its own, and innocent 

 enough to exjiect like treatment from others, expectations, however, not 

 always realized. 



Note. — That there may be in future no misunderstanding regarding this Owl, and 

 for the purpose of comparing it with Whitney's, which bears some superficial resem- 

 blance, I give the following concise description, believed to be in every way pertinent. 

 Facial disk imperfect ; no ear-tufts ; tai'si densely feathered to the toes, which are 

 covered with hairs ; claws strong, sharp, much curved ; tail rather long, even ; wings 

 medium, or rather short; the fourth primary longest; iris, bright yellow : bill, cere, 

 and feet, dull greenish-yellow; soles, chrome-yellow ; mouth, livid flesh-color; upper 

 parts one shade of dark-brown, everywhere dotted with small circular spots of white ; 

 a collar of mixed blackish-brown and white, around the back of the neck; breast with 

 a baud of mottled-brown, separating the white throat from the white of the rest of 

 the under parts, which all have irregular lengthwise streaks of reddish-brown. Wings 

 and tail dusky-brown ; the feathers marked on both webs with a row of round white 

 spots, largest on the inner ; under wing-coverts white, crossed obliquely by a blackish 

 bar. Length of the male 7.U0 inches, or a little less ; extent of wings, 14.50 ; wing, 

 3.75; tail,:).00; of the female, length 7.50; extent, 15.50, &c. In the female the upper 

 parts are rather ligliter, with fewer larger spots, and a nearly obsolete nuchal collar ; 

 but both sexes vary in the tint of the upper pai'ts, which ranges from pure deep brown 

 to pale grayish, almost olivaceous brown, probably according to age and season, the 

 newer feathers being darker than they are when old and worn. 



WHITNEY'S OWL* — Micrathene whitneyi, {Cooper), Coues. 



This singular little Owl is one of the most noteworthy and interesting 

 of the many late additions to oar knowledge of western birds. Until 

 recently, the last-noticed species was properly regarded as the smallest 

 of its family in North America ; but it somewhat surpasses Whitney's 

 in size. The latter is not so long as many of our Sparrows, being the 



* Athene ichitiieiii, Coop., Pr. Cal. Acad. 1801, 118 (Fort Mojave, Arizona). 



Mkrathoie ichitncyi, CouKs, Pr. Phila. Acad. 1860, 51. — Elliot, B. N. A. i, p. xxix, 



pi. — . — Coop., B. Cal. i, 1870, 442.— Ghays., (quid. Lawr., Ann. Lye. N. Y. 



(Socorro).— CouKS, Key, 1872, 207.— B. B. & E., N. A. B. iii, 1874, 87. 

 Rah. — Arizona, Southern California, and southward fo Socorro. 



