98 OWLS 



to owls, but they are usually indifferent to their pre- 

 sence or absence. If they knew their own interests, 

 they would take every means in their power to en- 

 courage these birds, and for the following reasons : 



Owls, most of them all of those, indeed, which 

 occur frequently in this country are solitary noc- 

 turnal hunters, and their structure has been beautifully 

 specialised for that vocation. The plumage is soft and 

 velvety, rendering the flight noiseless, in strange con- 

 trast to the whirring of a cock pheasant, which warns 

 his harem to lie low in the presence of danger, or the 

 whistling wings of most of the duck tribe, the sound 

 of which enables a number of them flying through the 

 darkness to keep company with each other. On the 

 other hand, the ear of the owl is developed in an 

 extraordinary degree, so important it is that he should 

 hear the slightest rustle or chirp of crouching mouse. 

 The long-eared and short-eared owls are named, not 

 from their ears at all, but from the horn-like tufts of 

 feathers on the head ; nevertheless, their true ears are 

 very remarkable, the conch being enormously exagger- 

 ated and furnished with an operculum. But the most 

 extraordinary feature in the ears of these owls is that 

 they are not perfect pairs the orifice opens upwards 

 on one side of the head and downwards on the other, 

 so that the smallest sound may be heard from what- 

 ever direction it proceeds. In some species this want 

 of symmetry extends inwards to several of the bones 

 of the head. Then the eyes afford another instance of 

 special adaptation for night work, the pupil being 



