SOME SUSPICIOUS CHARACTERS 161 
ever so many days, below the porch of the pigeon-house,” 
said Tommy, pulling a bunch of paper from his pocket; 
“TI guess the Red Owl meant to live there this winter.” 
He spread out the paper before Gray Lady, who was now 
sitting at the table turning over the pages of a large book 
in red covers. It was a reference book, in two volumes, 
that she often used to look up stories of the birds about 
which the children asked. The name of the book was 
Life Histories of North American Birds, and they were 
written and collected by Major Bendire, who was both one 
of the Wise Men and an officer in our army. Putting in a 
mark at the page where Screech Owl began, she closed the 
book and looked at the contents of the paper. 
“Yes, Tommy,” she said presently, “these are not only 
Owl balls, but there is the fur and bones of a mouse in 
each.” And deftly separating the wads with the point of 
a pair of scissors and taking out a tiny skull, she motioned 
the children to look at it through a reading-glass, each one 
in turn. 
“Does the Screech Owl live everywhere in the United 
States?” asked Dave, after he and Tommy had picked 
out enough of the tiny bones from the fur to piece out the 
entire skeleton of a mouse. 
“This same species of Screech Owl that we have here is 
found all through the eastern part of North America, but 
there is a Screech Owl, of some sort, to be found in the 
other parts of the country; thus, there is a Florida 
Screech Owl; one for California; another for the Rocky 
Mountains; one for Mexico, and one for Puget Sound, 
besides several others, and, of them all, the Rocky Moun- 
tain Owl is said to be the handsomest. 
- M 
