50 DIVISION I. VERTEBRAL ANIMALS.—CLASS II. AVES. 
“His favorite residence is in the dark solitudes of deep swamps, covered 
with a growth of gigantic timber ; and here, as soon as the evening draws on, 
and mankind retire to rest, he sends forth such sounds as seem scarcely to belong ; 
to this world. . © . Along the mountain shores of the Ohio, and amidst the 
deep forests of Indiana, alone and reposing in the woods, this ghostly watch- 
man has frequently warned me of the approach of morning, and amused me 
with his singular exclamations. Sometimes, sweeping down and around my 
fire, uttering a loud and sudden * Waugh Of Waugh O !’ sufficient to 
have alarmed a whole garrison. He has other nocturnal solos, one of which 
yery strikingly resembles the half-suppressed screams of a person suffocating 
or throttled.” 
The flight of this bird is elevated, rapid, and graceful. It sails with ap- 
parent ease in large circles, and rises and descends without the least difh- 
culty, by merely inclining its wings or its tail as it passes through the air. 
Now and then it glides silently close over the earth, with incomparable 
velocity, and drops, as if shot dead, on the prey beneath. At other times 
it suddenly alights on the top of a fence, stake, or dead stump, and utters a 
shriek so horrid, that the woods around echo to its dismal sound. During 
the utterance of the deep, gurgling cries, so well described by Wilson, it 
moves its body, and particularly its head, in various grotesque ways, and 
at intervals violently snaps its bill. Its food consists of various gallinaceous 
birds, half-grown turkeys, domestic poultry of all kinds, ducks, grouse, 
hares, opossums, and squirrels; and whenever chance throws a dead fish 
on the shore, this bird feeds on it with peculiar avidity. The Virginian 
Horned Owl is very powerful, and equally spirited. Mallards, Guinea 
fowl, and common fowls fall an easy prey, and are carried off in its talons 
to the depth of the woods. “ When wounded,” says Audubon, “it exhibits 
a revengeful tenacity of spirit, scarcely surpassed by the noblest of the 
vagle tribe; disdaining to scramble away, it faces its enemy with undaunted 
courage, protruding its powerful talons, and snapping its bill. Its large, 
gogele eyes open and shut in quick succession, and the feathers of its body 
are puffed up, and swell out its apparent bulk to nearly double the natural 
size. In some districts it is a great nuisance to the settler, making sad 
havoc among his stock of poultry. Among some of the Indian nations a 
sort of reverential horror is entertained towards this bird, and the priests and 
conjurers haye adopted it as the symbol of their office, carrying about with 
them a stuffed specimen with glass eyes, which excites general awe. This 
bird usually constructs a bulky nest in the forked branch of a tree, composed 
externally of crooked sticks, and lined with coarse grass and feathers. The 
eggs are three or four in number, and of a dull white.” 
In size, this species is nearly as large as the European representative, 
