290 RURAL BIRD LIFE. 



Both birds sit upon the eggs, and should you approach 

 them when sitting, they will hiss and snap their beaks, 

 to manifest their displeasure at your intrusion. Young 

 Barn Owls look like animated balls of down, with two 

 large black beads for eyes. They are voracious feeders, 

 too, if we may judge from the frequent visits of the old 

 birds with food. 



If you should happen to know of an Owl's nest, stand 

 some evening near it when the old birds ^re rearing 

 their young, keep quiet and motionless, and notice how 

 frequently the old birds feed them. Every ten minutes 

 or so the soft flap flap of their wings will be heard, the 

 male and female alternately, and you will obtain a brief 

 glimpse of them through the gloom as they enter the 

 nesting-place. They remain inside but a short time, 

 sharing the food equally amongst their brood, and then 

 are off again to hunt for more. All night, were you to 

 have the inclination to observe them, you would find 

 they pass to and fro with food, only ceasing their labours 

 at dawn. The young as soon as they reach maturity are 

 abandoned by their parents ; they quit the nest and seek 

 out haunts elsewhere; while the old birds rear another, 

 and not unfrequently two more broods, during the re- 

 mainder of the season. 



The food of the Barn Owl is composed chiefly of the 

 various species of field mice, the larger kinds of night- 

 flying beetles, and he will also occasionally snatch a 

 benighted Finch or Warbler from the hedgerows, and 

 take the rats from old water-courses and stack-yards. So 

 that after all he is not such a pilfering, useless creature 

 as is so generally imagined. Think, I pray you, what 

 mischief the countless mice and rats would work, were 

 they left unmolested. There would scarcely be a rick 

 free from them, despite all the * vermin killers ' extant 



