380 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
and stands within fifty yards of the parsonage house. This tower 
was annually, and may still be, the breeding quarters of birds of 
this species, and also their usual resort in the daytime at all 
periods of the year. Moreover, the greater part of the land in 
the parish was arable, and large barns were conspicuous in every 
farmyard. Consequently White Owls were among the commonest 
of the feathered tribes, and in the dark their vicinity would often 
be announced by a protracted and discordant screech. 
In 1854 we left Weston-on-the-Green, the scene of the 
foregoing observations, and removed to our present home in 
Leicestershire. Here we found matters reversed, and Brown 
Owls by far more numerous than their allies. Our garden is 
very large, and contains within its precincts a portion of a large 
wood, by which it is bounded on the eastern side. This wood is 
the residence of many Brown Owls, and in 1877 a pair of these 
birds built their nest in a clump of fir trees in our own garden; 
they might be seen at any time throughout the summer. Often 
in the day, and always by night, loud and oft-repeated hootings 
proceeded from the trees around the nest; but I never heard a 
single screech. 
Such has been my own experience, and such the opportunities 
of observation for a period of more than thirty years. I am 
therefore able distinctly and positively to assert that the normal 
ery of the Brown Owl, Syrnium aluco, is that ‘“ hoo-00-00-00,” 
known by the term “hooting,” and that the normal cry of the 
White Owl, Strix flammea, is that discordant “screech,” the 
fruitful cause of much alarm to superstitious minds, and, as 
I think, of much error to some naturalists. I cannot, and do not, 
assert that the White Owl is incapable of hooting; nor, on the 
other hand, that the Brown Owl is incapable of screeching. All 
that I can say in the matter is that I never heard a White Owl 
hoot, or a Brown Owl screech; and that it would require the 
positive and personal testimony of an ornithologist whose know- 
ledge of these birds was beyond question to convince me that 
either species emits sounds so unusual to it. 
The call-note of both species is almost exactly similar; it is 
often repeated as a prelude to their more specific noises, and may 
possibly have led to mistakes; but this does not affect anything 
that I have said, for I have often seen the Brown Owl hoot, and 
still more frequently have seen the White Owl screech, both on 
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