HIS NOTES ON THE LILFORD COLLECTION 261 



as he passed near the ash-tree in which there 

 was a brood of young a fact of which he was 

 quite unconscious. 



' I confess that when this story was originally 

 told to me by a third person I had my doubts 

 as to its truth, but last summer I had an 

 opportunity of inquiring from the aforesaid 

 neighbour, who assured me that not only was 

 this story perfectly true, but that he had been 

 again attacked last year in a different locality 

 by a Little Owl that no doubt had young ones in 

 the roof of an old church hard by. These Little 

 Owls are very easily tamed if taken in hand 

 whilst quite young, and besides their taste for 

 mice are very efficient in the destruction of 

 cockroaches and other beetles. 



' I cannot help once more taking up a text 

 that I have, I fear, worn almost threadbare 

 already ; it is never destroy or molest an owl 

 of any sort. I consider all the owls are not 

 only harmless, but most useful, and the Barn, 

 White, or Screech Owl as perhaps the most 

 serviceable to man of English birds. I think 

 that farmers and gamekeepers have discovered 

 that in destroying owls they are murdering their 



