OWLS. 355 



him with a light, see him contract the pupils of his eyes, and 

 then, as you retreat, expand them until they seem like glow- 

 ing orbs of fire. Approach him with food, and observe the 

 eager ferocity with which he swallows it, when possible, 

 doing so at a single gulp. Approach him again, attempt to 

 soothe him, and you cannot hesitate to pronounce him an 

 irreclaimable savage. 



d. His cries are all unearthly. Sometimes he utters a 

 horrid scream, sometimes notes which suggest the strangula- 

 tion of some unhappy person in the woods, and at other times 

 his loud hooting, hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo. Being, it is said, attracted 

 by camp-fires, like other species, he often amuses the traveler 

 with these agreeable and soothing sounds. In short, no bird 

 has a character less pleasant to contemplate than the Great 

 Horned Owl. 



In the space left by a change in the text, it may not be 

 amiss to give an amusing instance of the fictions credited by 

 some old writers. Charlevoix, says Wilson, wrote that cer- 

 tain Owls caught mice for their winter's store, and, confining 

 them, fattened them on grain. 



VII. NYCTEA. 



A. NYCTEA. Snowy Owl. In Massachusetts, not uncom- 

 mon in winter near the sea.* 



* The Snowy Owl has been charac- spring- migrant along the coast, a few 



terized by most writers as a " winter remaining through the winter." This, 



visitant "to New England. This state- however, must be still further quali- 



ment, although certainly true as far as fied by the adjective ' ' irregular/' for 



it goes, is not sufficiently exact, for by during some years no Snowy Owls are 



far the greater number of the birds reported from any part of New Eng- 



that enter northern New England in land, while in others only a very few 



late September and early October pass are seen. Indeed, they do not occur 



to the southward of Boston before the in really large numbers oftener than 



end of November, returning (that is, once in every four or five years. The 



such of them as have escaped the greatest flight on record took place in 



eager pursuit of gunners and taxi- the autumn of 1876, when most of the 



dermists) in March and early April, leading New England taxidermists se- 



Hence, with respect, at least, to the cured from fifty to one hundred and 



region north of Cape Cod, it would be fifty birds each. The Snowy Owl is 



more correct to term the bird " a com- occasionally taken inland. W. B. 

 mon autumn and not uncommon early 



