BARN OWL. 43 
nest is sometimes on the ground, and perhaps even in a rabbit- 
burrow. The eggs are three in number, and scarcely differ the 
least in size from those of the bird last named. Young Grouse 
and other birds breeding about the moors are abundantly sup- 
plied by the parent Owls to their young when the nest chances 
to have been made in such a locality, and the old ones are very 
jealous of seeing their progeny too nearly approached, and 
expose themselves almost as fearlessly on such occasions as 
either Partridge or Grouse. Their local name of Hawk-Owl is 
derived from the circumstance that they pursue their prey— 
regularly ‘“ hawking” for it—during the day time. 
28. BARN OWL—(Stériz flammea). 
White Owl, Yellow Owl, Screech Owl, Gilly Howlet, Howlet, 
Madge Howlet, Church Owl, Hissing Owl.—This common and 
useful bird breeds by preference in some building or part of one , 
a church tower, dove-cot, ruined mansion, or castle, and the like. 
My most familiar boy-acquaintance, however, was with the 
nesting place and habits of a pair which nested for many 
consecutive years in a slight hollow in the crown of a large 
pollard Elm tree in my father’s church-yard in Essex. There 
were usually three or four young ones year by year, often with 
perceptible differences of growth among them. Indeed it is 
well known that this Owl and the last named, and probably 
others as well, lay their eggs in instalments, as it were, and 
when the first batch of two is about hatching or nearly so, 
other two are deposited in addition, and thus hatched in their 
turn almost as much by their brother and sister as by their 
mother. Quainter, graver, odder, stranger, more irresistibly 
comic creatures than these young Owls I never saw; and the 
hissing and snoring, and peering looks at the spectator, and 
strange antic contortions I heard and saw, baflle all attempts 
