THE BARN OWL. 285 



return to its nest every quarter of an hour with a mouse in 

 its claws. 



Its principal food consists of mice and rats, which it 

 destroys in great numbers ; and, as it thereby renders valu- 

 able services to the farmer, we find Grahame, in his British 

 Georgics, saying: — 



Let the screeching Owl 

 A sacred bird be held ; protect her nest, 

 Whether in neighbouring crag, within the reach 

 Of venturous boy, it hang, or in the rent 

 Of some old echoing tower, where her sad plaint 

 The livelong night she moans, save when she skims, 

 Prowling, along the ground, or, through your barn. 

 Her nightly round performs ; unwelcome guest ! 

 Whose meteor-eyes shoot horror through the dark. 

 And numb the tiny revellers with dread. 



September. 



The Barn Owl likewise feeds upon small birds and some- 

 times upon insects, the remains of which have been recog- 

 nised on examination of the ejected pellets ^ which are found 

 near its favourite haunts. 



This owl does not hoot, its usual note being a loud 

 scream, which, when heard at night in a lonely place, such 

 as an ancient churchyard, or among the ruins of an old tower 

 or abbey, adds to the weirdness of the scene, and recalls the 

 graphic lines of Blair ; — 



The wind is up : hark ! how it howls ! methinks 



Till now I never heard a sound so dreary : 



Doors creak, and windows clap, and night's foul bird, 



Rooked in the spire, screams loud : the gloomy aisles, 



Black-plastered, and hung round with shreds of 'scutcheons, 



And tattered coats of arms, send back the sound. 



Laden with heavier airs, from the low vaults, 



The mansions of the dead. Roused from their slumbers, 



1 Like other rapacious birds the White Owl ejects pellets, consisting of the 

 indigestible parts of the animals and birds upon which it feeds. Mr. Seebohm 

 mentions {Hist. Brit. Birds, vol. i. p. 149) that " out of seven hundred pellets of 

 this Owl, which were carefully examined by Dr. Altum, remains were found of 

 16 bats, 2513 mice, 1 mole, and 22 birds, 19 of which were sparrows." 



