MOTTLED TUFTED-OWL. 455 



the inner edge. The eyes are very large ; the eyelids, which 

 are equally mobile, with broad, thin, crenate margins, and ci- 

 liary fringes of distantly barbed feathers. The conch of the 

 ear extends in a semilunar form from over the eye to the base 

 of the lower mandible ; its posterior elevated margin three 

 inches in length, its anterior raised into a semicircular flap or 

 operculum, beset with recurved feathers. The tarsi are short 

 and rather stout ; the toes also short, and feathered ; the outer 

 two connected by a short basal web ; the first very short, the 

 second and fourth nearly equal, all with two terminal scutella. 

 Claws long, tapering to a very fine point, curved in the fourth 

 of a circle, compressed but convex on the sides, the first and 

 second rounded beneath ; the inner two much smaller. 



The plumage is extremely soft ; the feathers generally ob- 

 long. The facial disks, which are large and complete, are com- 

 posed of circular series of weak, slender, slightly recurved fea- 

 thers, having distant filaments. The ruff" also is complete, its 

 feathers oblong and recurved. The disks meet at the base of 

 the upper mandible, where the feathers are more bristly. The 

 wings are long, and of great breadth ; the primary quills very 

 broad, with slender shafts, the outer a little incurved toward 

 the end ; the second longest, the first nearly an inch shorter ; 

 the secondary quills fifteen, broad and rounded. The first 

 quill with a sinus near the tip of the inner web, and the barbs 

 of the outer web free and recurved at the end in its whole 

 length ; those of the second toward the end also recurved, as 

 is the case with the first alular feather. The tail is rather short, 

 slightly arched, a little rounded, the lateral feathers being some- 

 what more than half an inch shorter. 



The bill is brownish-black, the cere flesh-coloured, as is 

 the inside of the mouth. The irides are orange ; the claws 

 brownish-black ; at the base tinged with grey. The ground 

 colour of the plumage is buft'or reddish-yellow. The upper part 

 of the head minutely mottled with whitish, brownish-black, 

 and light-red ; the two elongated tufts, of which the largest 

 feathers are an inch and a half in length, are lidit reddish 

 towards the base, brownish-black in the central part to the 



