Genus Strix. 187 



barley, which had been swallowed by these birds of prey, en- 

 closed within the crops of the pigeons, remained entire, but some- 

 what enlarged and softened by heat and moisture ; no part of the 

 bones remained. The intestines of birds of this genus are short 

 and large, but the Osprey (F. Ilaliactus) forms an exception to 

 this rule. To the thin membranous stomach of this bird, there 

 is attached an intestinal canal measuring ten feet eight inches in 

 length, and in some parts scarcely exceeding a crow-quill in size. 

 This instance may therefore be cited as an example of an animal 

 possessing a carnivorous stomach with a herbivorous intestine. 

 The canal in most of the species of this genus, being, in length, 

 compared with that of the bird itself, as three to one, but in the 

 Osprey it is as eight to one. 



In the Otter the intestinal canal is very long, equal in size, and 

 without cascal appendage. In the Seal the intestines are also 

 long, with a small ca?cum ; may it not therefore be concluded that 

 the small quantify of nutriment which fish, as an article of food, 

 is known to aflbrd, renders this extent of canal necessary in 

 order that every portion may be extracted ? The ceecal appen- 

 dages in birds vary in length from one inch to twenty-four, and 

 nature, as if to mark the uniformity of her plan, gives minute 

 rudiments of these vermiform appearances even to birds of the 

 most decided carnivorous habits. 



Proceeding to the species of the genus S/rix, their characters 

 will be found as opposite to those of the true Falcons as their 

 habits. The body stripped of its feathers has some resemblance 

 to the triangular form of the diurnal birds of prey, but the pec- 

 toral muscles arc small, the sternum, keel and clavicles diminished 

 in size and strength, and the furcula, which in the Falcons is circu- 

 lar, broad, and strong, will be found in all the species of owls to be 

 angular, slender and weak. The sternum marked No. 2, is a 

 representation of that part in a Wood-Owl (S. Slridula) which 

 weighed nineteen ounces ; the sternum before referred to No. 1, as 

 that of the Peregrine Falcon (F. Peregriniis)\f2iS from a male bird 

 weighing twenty-three ounces ; both are figured of the natural 

 size, and the disproportion in extent of surface and power, Avill be 

 immediately apparent. From the loose and soft nature of the 



