HAWKS AND OWLS. 37 
containing hen and young pheasants, flap its wings 
on the coop, and, when the young pheasants ran out, 
alarmed by the noise, it pounced on them and carried 
them off one by one. I myself have often seen the 
owls hawking round the pheasant-coops, but always 
put it down as evidence of the presence of mice, 
coming, no doubt, after the scraps of food left by 
the young pheasants. If the ,barn-owl does thus 
destroy young pheasants, he ought to be reckoned as 
doubly a farmer’s friend in these anti-game days !” 
The second accusation is of much the same cha- 
racter, and is to the effect that a brood of young 
pheasants has been found inside an owl; “or,” sug- 
gests my informant, by way of parenthesis, ‘‘ say two 
owls.” It has often been stated that the barn-owl 
is apt to be troublesome in the preserves, but the 
occasions upon which it misbehaves itself seem to be 
so very few and far between as almost to be un- 
worthy of consideration. 
Tue Long-eared or Horned Owl, although less plen- 
tiful than the preceding, is yet far from uncommon 
in many parts of Great Britain; and, although the 
services which it renders to mankind are qualified in 
some little degree by certain unlicensed proceedings, 
the bird is yet fully worthy of our protection and 
encouragement. 
The following statement by Prevost Paradol will 
give an idea of the usual character of the food of this 
owl :— 
‘January, mice; February and March, the same; 
