HAWKS AND OWLS. 11 



crops. As an instance of the good the barn owl does in the 

 destruction of these depredators, I will mention that on an 

 evening during the summer I was enjoying a pipe with a 

 farmer friend of mine, sitting near an old barn, wherein a pair 

 of owls were then rearing their young. My attention was 

 especially attracted to them by observing their frequent 

 arrival, with a mouse on each occasion grasped firmly in the 

 claw. The supper of the young family that evening consisted, 

 to my knowledge, of seventeen mice. Can any stronger plea 

 for the protection of this grand old English bird be urged ? " 

 And another observes of a kindred bird, the brown owl : "As 

 an instance of the rat-destroying propensities of the brown 

 owl, a keeper, in the employ of a large landed proprietor in 

 an English shire, found at the entrance of a rabbit's 

 burrow a dead rat for thirteen consecutive mornings. This 

 burrow last summer was occupied by a pair of brown owls 

 for breeding purposes, and they then had young ones. We 

 can scarcely suppose that these thirteen rats were the only 

 ones destroyed during the thirteen days ; but if they were, 

 surely an occasional leveret or other game is but a small 

 compensation for the benefits conferred by the destruction 

 of a rat a day. Brown owls will now be protected on this 

 estate by the gamekeepers. May this good example be 

 followed by others ! " 



Groom Napier, a first-class authority, tells us of the long- 

 eared owl, " the food of this species in April I have ascer- 

 tained to be beetles, bats, and mice. 



" Barn owl. Two owls contained dormice, water rats, and 

 bats. Three contained field mice and beetles. 



" Tawny owl. Two of these birds contained bats, but in 

 one other case a young rabbit and two mice were taken from 

 a stomach. 



" The white owl is rather destructive to the young 

 rabbits of Abbotsleigh Down, Hunts. But we may place 

 all the owls, on the whole, as A 1 among the farmer's 

 friends." 



