THE SNOWY OWL 25 



St Francis of Assisi, when he spoke of "his brother 

 the wolf and his dear sister the sheep," was using 

 language which would have been more intelligible, 

 and might have expressed better the feelings of 

 his remotest progenitors, than they did of his own 

 contemporaries. 



In Morocco, the Jews and Arabs, who hate and 

 differ from each other in almost every other respect, 

 agree in their belief about the owl. They believe 

 that the owl is the bird of Satan, and that his 

 shriek causes the death of infants a catastrophe 

 which they strive to avert by reiterated curses, or by 

 copious libations of water in the courts of their 

 houses.* And Ovid, who, in his Fasti, describes 

 the leading characteristics of the owl in two lines as 

 well as they ever have been described 



" Grande caput ; stantes oculi ; rostra apta rapinae ; 

 Canities pennis, unguibus hamus adest " 



goes on to tell us, in curious agreement with the 

 superstitions of Morocco, how, in ancient times at 

 Rome, it was believed that witches were able, by 

 their magic arts, to transform themselves into screech 

 owls, or screech owls to transform themselves into 

 witches, and that, entering the window of the 



* Dresser's Birds of Europe, vol. v. 



