AND THE BENEFITS IT CONFERS ON MAN. 273 



said on this important subject ; and he always stood better in her 

 books, when he had managed to shoot a bird of this bad and 

 mischievous family. However, in 1813, on my return from the wilds 

 of Guiana, having suffered myself and learned mercy, I broke in 

 pieces the code of penal laws which the knavery of the gamekeeper 

 and the lamentable ignorance of the other servants had hitherto put 

 in force, far too successfully, to thin the numbers of this poor, harm- 

 less, unsuspecting tribe. On the ruin of the old gateway, against 

 which, tradition says, the waves of the lake have dashed for the better 

 part of a thousand years, I made a place with stone and mortar 

 about four feet square, and fixed a thick oaken stick firmly into it. 

 Huge masses of ivy now quite cover it. In about a month or so 

 after it was finished, a pair of barn owls came and took up their 

 abode in it. I threatened to strangle the keeper if ever, after this,, 

 he molested either the old birds or their young ones ; and I assured 

 the housekeeper that I would take upon myself the whole responsi- 

 bility of all the sickness, woe, and sorrow that the new tenants might 

 bring into the Hall. She made a low curtsy, as much as to say, 

 " Sir, I fall into your will and pleasure." But I saw in heiLeye, that 

 she had made up her mind to have to do with things of fearful and 

 portentous shape, and to hear many a midnight wailing in the sur- 

 rounding woods. I do not think that, up to the day of this old lady's 

 death, which took place in her eighty-fourth year, she ever looked 

 with pleasure or contentment on the barn owl, as it flew round the 

 large sycamore trees which grew near the old ruined gateway. 



When I found that this first settlement on the gateway had suc- 

 ceeded so well, I set about forming other establishments. This year 

 I have had four broods, and I trust that next season I can calculate 

 on having nine. This will be a pretty increase, and it will help to 

 supply the place of those which, in this neighbourhood, are still un- 

 fortunately doomed to death by the hand of cruelty or superstition. 

 We can now always have a peep at the owls, in their habitation on 

 the old ruined gateway, whenever we choose. Confident of protec- 

 tion, these pretty birds betray no fear when the stranger mounts 

 up to their place of abode. I would here venture a surmise, that 

 the barn owl sleeps standing. Whenever we go to look at it, we in- 

 variably see it upon the perch, bolt upright ; and often with its eyes 



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