gather around and add to the row, causing him to glare and hiss and snap his 

 bill in an effort to scare them away. But they are persistent and give him no 

 peace, so he finally tumbles out of the hiding place that no longer hides and 

 makes off to some other retreat. In the night time, however, it is a different 

 matter. Then he is the fiercest of birds, strong and daring. He is the feathered 

 tiger of the forest. Partridge, quail, and many other wild birds large and small, 

 go to supply the family larder. Chickens, guinea fowl, and even turkeys are 

 attacked in the poultry yard and are killed far beyond his need of food. So 

 destructive of game birds and poultry is this great horned owl that it is condemned 

 by both national and state governments. Quite likely the sentence is just, yet the 

 villain has his good qualities. Birds are not his only prey. He kills large num- 

 bers of small animals that are much more destructive than himself. The rabbits 

 that girdle the young orchard trees, the mice that destroy great quantities of 

 grain, those prowling chicken thieves, the rat and the skunk, "await alike the 

 inevitable hour." "Four out of every five of these owls that are brought in have 

 been scented by a skunk. Two nests that have come under the writer's observa- 

 tion had the remains of skunks on them beside the young." 



The department of agriculture at Washington, after a careful and extensive 

 study of the food habits of the owls, condemns the great horned owl as unworthy 

 of protection. But it is the only one condemned. All of the other owls regularly 

 found are found to be very beneficial on account of the very large numbers of 

 mice, shrews, gophers, rats, rabbits, grasshoppers, and beetles that are destroyed 

 by them. 



The great horned owl's repertoire consists of two performances. His com- 

 mon "Whoo, hoo-hoo! Whoo, hoo-hoo-hooj" is startling but not thrilling. His 

 uncommon one is positively uncanny. Of all wild yells of owl at night, the great 

 horned's screech stirs deepest fright. Mr. Chapman describes it as a "loud, pierc- 

 ing scream, one of the most blood-curdling sounds I have ever heard in the 

 woods." "When that note comes," says Mr. Mathews, "one will think he hears 

 the 'crack 'o doom.' " If the screech owl's note is weird, this is horrible; it has 

 the sound of murder in it ; no cat on a back-yard fence can produce a yell as 

 hideous ! Upon hearing the screech for the first time one's mind instinctively 

 reverts to those lines in Scott's Lady of the Lake. 



"At once there rose so wild a yell 



Within that dark and narrow dell, 



As all the fiends from heaven that fell, 



Had pealed the banner-cry of hell !" 



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