412 The Zoologist — October, 1866. 



Common Buzzard {Falco Buteo). 



" More pity that the eagle should be mewed, 

 While kites and buzzards prey at liberty." 



Richard III., Act i. Scene 1. 



" To what form * * * should wit larded with malice * * * lead him to ? 

 To be an owl, a puilock, or a herring without a roe, I would not care." — Troilus and 

 Cressida, Act v. Scene 1 . 



" 0, slow-wing'd turtle, shall a buzzard take thee ? 

 Ay, for a turtle as he takes a buzzard." 



Taming of the Shrew, Act i. Scene 1. 



Staunton suggests that there is a play upon the words here, and 

 that "buzzard" in the second line means a beetle, so called on 

 account of its buzzing noise. 



Owl {Strix Jlummea). 



" A mousing owl." 



Macbeth, Act ii. Scene 4. 



" They say the owl was a baker's daughter." 



Hamlet, Act iv. Scene 5. 



Mr. Staunton, in his edition of Shakespeare's Plays, says this 

 alludes to a tradition still current in some parts of England. " Our 

 Saviour went into a baker's shop, where they were baking, and asked 

 for some bread to eat. The mistress of the shop immediately put a 

 piece of dough into the oven to bake for him, but was reprimanded 

 by her daughter, who, insisting that the piece of dough was too large, 

 reduced it to a very small size. The dough, however, immediately 

 afterwards began to swell, and presently became of a most enormous 

 size. Whereupon the baker's daughter cried out, ' Heugh, heugh, 

 hengh,' which owl-like noise probably induced our Saviour, for her 

 wickedness, to transform her into that bird." (Vol. iii. p. 403j. 



The owl has ever been regarded as a bird of ill omen, and by the 

 superstitious its presence has been supposed to denote some approach- 

 ing evil. No wonder, then, thai throughout the whole of the Plays, 

 but more particularly in the Tragedies, we find frequent allusions to 

 the owl as the " obscure," " ominous," " fearful " and " fatal " " bird 

 of night." This bird is mentioned at least thirty times, and at the 

 risk of being thought tedious we have collected the following extracts 



