20 THE ORNITHOLOGISTS’ AND OOLOGISTS’ SEMI-ANNUAL. 
common nester, but a species that I was not sure of, from the imper- 
fect sight which I was able to obtain, as it circled around at a consid- 
erable height. 
Ascending the tree to the nest, I found that it contained three eggs, 
of a greenish-white color, with a few indistinct brown markings. The 
nest was quite a bulky affair, composed of sticks and large weed- 
stalks. One dead elm stick I noticed as being over four feet in length 
and an inch in diameter at its thickest part. The lining was of grape- 
vine bark and oak leaves. 
Both birds now appeared upon the scene, alighting near by on an- 
other tree. I drew out my glass and took a close look at them, and 
soon recognized them by the wide transverse band across neck and 
breast (ashy-brown in one and light rufous in the other,) as being a 
pair of the handsome Swainson’s Buzzard (Buteo Swainsoni) and I 
felt correspondingly elated over the possession of the three eggs, 
which I put into a yarn mitten and attaching the ball of string to it, 
lowered with great care to the ground, which in a very few minutes I 
also reached. 
I now started in to look this piece of woods over carefully for fur- 
ther finds, and had not gone over two hundred yards before in a nest 
about forty feet up in an elm, I saw the ear tufts of a Great Horned 
Owl, followed soon by the big yellow eyes and head, staring down at 
me as if enquiring what business had I intruding there. 
At the first click of the climbers against the tree, the bird left the 
nest and flew to a distant part of the woods; but returned with her 
mate as I neared the nest, and they gave me a fine serenading with 
their hoo ! hoo ! hoos ! with many grotesque bowings and swayings of 
their bodies from side to side. 
I found two snow-white eggs in the nest, rather below the average 
size of eggs of the Bubo V. I lowered them as before and soon fol- 
lowed them to the ground. ‘The Owls again flying to a distant part 
of the timber as soon as I left the nest and commenced to descend. 
I found nothing further of interest in these woods, so returned to 
my horse and to the highway. Carefully secreting my eggs, I now 
rode two miles further to another large body of timber, and at once 
set about searching for nests. Soon finding one in the top of a large 
black-oak ; but no Hawk being present I did not climb it, as it is my 
rule never to climb to a nest unless I know it to be occupied. 
Going a few hundred yards further, I discovered another nest in a 
