WHAT I HAVE DONE WITH BIRDS 



place overlooked the tree-tops and gave ine a view of a wide 

 stretch of the lake, the river creeping away in the distance, the 

 gleaming trunks of birch and the spiral tops of cedars lifting 

 above an impenetrable tangle of interlocking trees and bushes. 



Every morning a great Eagle with a golden head, either fish- 

 ing or preying on water birds, hung above the lake, and how my 

 guide and I did hunt for the nest of that bird ! We never found 

 it, but in our search we located, in a great hollow tree back of our 

 stopping-place, a family that repaid our disappointment. If you 

 never saw Strix pratincola in her chosen location, busy keeping 

 .house, then you have missed one of the rarest sights of bird-land. 

 We named her "Monkey- face," buffoon that she was,) the minute 

 we caught sight of her, blinkingly peering from her front door 

 to learn if it were too early to go hunting and sadly shaking her 

 low-hung head, as if all the woes of bird-land rested heavily on 

 her shoulders. (Her face was heart-shaped, sharply outlined by 

 several rows of crisp up-standing brown feathers and covered 

 with white feathers lightly tinged with the pale ash and lavender 

 which proved her a last year's bird. Her eyes were small, for an 

 Owl, and slightly oblong. Her beak and mouth were almost hid- 

 den by long silky down. Her breast was paler than her face and 

 touched here and there with tiny black feathers. On the top of 

 her head began a beautiful light tan-color that took on strength 

 as it spread over her back, wings and tail. A-top her head and 

 across her shoulders she was thickly sprinkled with tiny black 

 feathers tipped with white. Her primaries and secondaries were 

 lightly barred with brown, but her tertiary and shoulder feathers 

 were solid tan, and each seemed to end with this peculiar tipping 

 of black and white. She had four strong toes, and her legs were 

 bare to the first joint. Later we saw her mate, and he closely re- 

 sembled her. All the difference we could note was that his face 

 and breast were snowy white, with the same markings, and his 



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