232 BRITISH AND EUROPEAN BIRDS. 



Thus assembled, the Monarch- commanded the 

 Owl, (*^) 

 To blow loud his trump to the nation of Fowl ; — 

 Not " hoo-hooj'** such as often is heard in the night. 

 When terror and fancy beget wild affright, 

 But a note such as never the owl blew before — 

 Over hill, over dale, went its echoing roar. 



conceived. The origin of the white variety is not known, but 

 it is said that it continues white in every climate. 

 Lord Byron calls the peacock 



"That royal bird whose tail's a diadem." 

 And Beattie thus describes it in the minstrel: 

 *' Though richest hues the peacock's plumes adorn, 

 Yet horror screams from his discordant throat/' 



The BicalcaratuSf or Iris-Peacock, is brown ; bead sub- 

 crested ; spurs tico ; rather larger than the pheasant ; inhabits 

 China. The TliibetanuSy or Thibet-Peacock, isc inereous, 

 streaked with blackish ; head sub-crested ; spurs two ; twenty- 

 five and a half inches long; inhabits Thibet. The Muticus, or 

 Japan-Peacock, is blue mixed with green > head with a 

 subulate crest; spurless; size of the cristatus; inhabits Japan. 



(**) Order, Accipitres, (^Linn.) Owl, the Great, the Long- 

 eared, the Tawny, the White, &c. 



The genus Strix, (Linn.) or Owl, includes more than eighty 

 species, scattered over Europe, Asia, and America, about half 

 of which are eared aud half earless ; several are common in this 

 country: they have a hooked bill, cereless; the nostrils are 

 oblong, covered with bristly recumbent feathers; head, auricles 

 and eyes large; tongue bifid; legs downy; toes four, claws 

 hooked and very sharp pointed. They fly abroad mostly by 



