162 BUBO MAXIMUS. 



ears were finely relieved against the sky. About this time we heard 

 some more " coo-hoos." Bones of birds, rats, and animals of that 

 size were in the immediate neighbourhood of the nest. Many points 

 of rock within a few hundred yards were white with dung ; and it 

 was said that several pairs of Owls frequent this mountain-side. At 

 the inn at Hornas, a mile or two back, was a lately trapped Berg-Uf, 

 nailed, with spread wings, to the wall. The trap had been baited 

 with a Hare. 



[The graphic account of this nest, which Mr. WoUey contributed to Mr. 

 Ilewitson's work (' Eggs B. B.' ed. 3. pp. 51-53), was contained in a letter to 

 me, the first I received from him from Scandinavia, dated " Haparanda, 2nd 

 June, 1853." As it gives no more details than will be found above, I abstain 

 from quoting it here, though it is decidedly a more finished production of his 

 pen than these notes, which were probably written down almost in the heat of 

 victory. Mr. Wolley was at this time literally following " in the footsteps of 

 Linnfeus," as Mr, Hewitson phrases it. " It was on the 20th May, after 

 climbing to the mysterious cave in Skulaberg," as he wrote to me, that he 

 found this nest. It is a singular coincidence that, according to the Old Style, 

 by which Linnaeus reckoned, he, in 1732, also visited this remarkable 

 place on the same day of the same month (' Lachesis Lcqyponica,^ vol. i, 

 pp, 52-55, and vol. ii, pp. 242-244).] 



§ 526. Two. — Salmojiirwi, East Bothnia, April 1854. 



Found by the boys at Salmo-jarwi, two or three days after Easter. 

 They had told me, in the winter, that they knew a breeding-place of 

 this bird on a rock. The eggs were split by the frost, for the birds 

 did not return to the nest after the lads had first visited it. One of 

 them subsequently selected the species of Huuhkaja [the name applied 

 about Muonioniska to both the largest Owls] from skins of the Lapp 

 and Eagle-Owl before him. It was of course the latter. 



[In 1855 this pair of Eagle-Owls seem to have bred near Siirki-lombola, in 

 the same district. The two eggs, taken on the 26th April, passed into the col- 

 lections of Mr. G. D. Rowley and the late Mr. J, D, Salmon,] 



§ 527. Two. — Siirki-pahta, Salmo-jarwi, East Bothnia. 1856. 

 Brought to Muoniovara, 8th June. 



[In April 1856 three other eggs of the Salmo-jarwi Eagle-Owls were taken. 

 These are now in the collections of Sir William IMiluer and Messrs. Bond and 

 Troughton. The two mentioned in the text appear to have been a second 

 laying of the same birds.] 



