FIRST DAY. 



do. Other birds may be loud at prime and 

 complin, but the owl's is the midnight 

 service. Apart from the superstitious feeling 

 from which some of the best informed of us 

 are scarcely free, there is something inex- 

 pressibly solemn in the note of the bird of 

 night. Have you ever, when threading a 

 wild wood, come upon some ivy-sheltered 

 nook protected from the blaze of the noon- 

 tide sun, and seen the owl perched in his 

 solitary retreat so near you that you might 

 strike him down with your staff? I have, 

 when a boy, often encountered him in that 

 way, and felt awed at the presence of the 

 majestic bird. How he loves the moulder- 

 ing pile which piety raised and fanaticism 

 shattered from roof- tree to crypt ! His 

 lineage could tell of the times when rude and 

 impious hands battered and defaced corbel 

 and mullion, and delicate tracery, wrought 

 by the cunningest craftsmen in Christendom. 

 Here he abides in dignified solitude, from 



