408 CORACIIFORMES CHAP. 
Granada and Venezuela, G. pumilum Brazil, G. nanum Chili and 
Patagonia. 
Sceloglaux albifacies, the Laughing Owl of New Zealand, is 
rufous-brown, with the middle of the feathers dark, and a few marks 
of white and buff above; the tail is barred with fulvous, the 
fairly perfect facial discs exhibit radiating brown streaks ; the toes 
are hairy. For an Owl this peculiar species has the head small, 
the wings short, and the metatarsi long; it strides along or hops 
at a considerable rate on the ground, and flies only at night, utter- 
ing a peculiar shrill laugh or a loud barking call-note. It is 
fast becoming extinct in its bleak mountain-haunts, where it 
conceals itself by day—and also nests—in dry crevices of rocky 
gullies ; it lays from one to three eggs at considerable intervals, 
if we may judge from captive specimens. The female is smaller 
than the male, who occasionally incubates. As the Maori rat of 
New Zealand is extinct, the food now consists of the introduced 
Mus decumanus, with insects, birds, and so forth. 
In the genus Ninox the prevailing colours are grey, brown, 
and rufous, relieved by a little black and white, the question of 
dichromatism not being yet settled. The facial discs are some- 
what imperfect. The thirty or more species extend from Mada- 
gascar, India, and Ceylon to Japan, Austraha, New Zealand, and 
the Solomon Islands, having their headquarters in the Moluccas 
and Papuasia; but, with the exception of Scops, there is perhaps 
no group in the Family where the status of the members is more 
doubtful. They are sometimes termed Hairy or Hawk-Owls, 
though the true Hawk-Owl is Surnia wlula. _N. seutulata, ranging 
from India to Japan, Formosa, Ternate and Flores, frequents 
forests and gardens, sallying forth at dusk, darting upon insects 
from its perch on some dead branch, uttering a reiterated double 
note, and laying its eggs on dried leaves in hollow trees. J. 
strenua, N. connivens, and N. boobook are Australian species, of 
which the first is a powerful bird with a hoarse, mournful voice, 
mainly nocturnal, but wakeful and speedy in the daytime. It 
frequents lonely forests and thick “ brushes” on hills, being less 
widely distributed than the more diurnal . connivens and W. 
boobook. The latter may be seen in sunlight capturing birds or 
insects in the woods, but the note of “ boobook,” or “ buck-buck,” 
from which it gets its native name, is only heard at night. The 
colonists compare the cry with “cuckoo,” and believe that the 
