THE OWL KIND. 113 



CHAPTER XIV. 



OF RAPACIOUS BIRDS OF THE OWL KIND, THAT 

 PREY BY NIGHT. 



HITHERTO we have been describing a tribe of 

 animals, who, though plunderers among their fel- 

 lows of the air, yet wage war boldly in the face 

 of day. We now come to a race equally cruel 

 and rapacious, but who add to their savage dis- 

 position the further reproach of treachery, and 

 carry on all their depredations by night. 



All birds of the owl kind may be considered as 

 nocturnal robbers, who, unfitted for taking their 

 prey while it is light, surprise it at those hours of 

 rest when the tribes of nature are in the least ex- 

 pectation of an enemy. Thus there seems no 

 link in nature's chain broken ; no where a dead 

 inactive repose ; but every place, every season, 

 every hour of the day and night, is bustling with 

 life, and furnishing instances of industry, self- 

 defence, and invasion. 



All birds of the owl kind have one common 

 mark, by which they are distinguished from 

 others ; their eyes are formed for seeing better in 

 the dusk than in the broad glare of sunshine. As 

 in the eyes of tigers and cats, that are formed for 

 a life of nocturnal depredation, there is a quality 

 in the retina that takes in the rays of light so 

 copiously as to permit their seeing in places al- 

 most quite dark j so in these birds there is the 



VOL. IV. H 



