io8 Allen's naturalist's library. 



dark recesses of a building or a tree, rather than the open 

 grass-country. Seven forms of the Common Barn-Owl are 

 recognised by naturahsts, but these birds vary in plumage 

 considerably, and they are all so closely connected by inter- 

 mediate forms, that it is difficult to say where one race ends 

 and another commences its range. 



The most distinct of the Barn-Owls are the large Slrix 

 castajiops and S. novce hollaitdice of Australia, all the other 

 species being merely forms of the ordinary Barn-Owl i^S. 

 flammeii). Some of these, however, are fairly recognisable as 

 races, especially the pale form, S. delicatitla^ of Australia and 

 Oceania, and the island races from the Cape Verd Islands 

 {Sfrix insular is), and the Galapagos Islands {Strix punctatis- 

 sinia), both of which are very dark and thickly spotted forms. 



I am still under the same impression as in 1875, when I 

 wrote the second volume of the " Catalogue of Birds," that 

 "there is one dominant type of Barn-Owl which prevails 

 generally over the continents of the Old and New Worlds, 

 being darker or lighter according to different localities, but 

 possessing no distinctive specific characters." 



I. THE 15ARN-OWL. STRIX FLAMMEA. 



Strix flamniea, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 133 (1766); Macgill. Drit. 



B. iii. p. 473 (1840) ; Sharpe, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. ii. p. 291 



(1875) ; Dresser, B. Eur. i. p. 237, pi. 302 (1879) ; B. O. 



U. List Br. B. p. 85 (1883); Saunders, Man. Br. B. p. 



281 (1889); Lilford, Col. Fig. Br. B. part xiv. (1890). 

 Aluco flaninieus, Newt. ed. Yarn Brit. B. i. p. 194 (1872); 



Seeb. Brit. B. i. p. 148(1883). 

 {Plate XL.) 

 Adult Male. — General colour above orange-buff, with white 

 spots at or near the end of each feather, relieved by a corre- 

 sponding spot of blackish ; the back and scapulars mottled 

 with silvery -grey ; quills orange-buff, shading off into whitish 

 near the base and on the inner webs, the secondaries rather 

 deeper orange, tipped with whitish, the innermost secondaries 

 mottled with grey like the back ; tail whitish, washed with pale 

 omnge, the centre feathers slightly speckled with brown, these 

 markings disappearing towards the outer feathers, which are 



