148 CAPE EARED OWL. 
RAPACES TSToCTURNJE. 
STRIGIDJE. 
Genus — Otus. fCuvier.J 
Sub-genus — Phasmoptynx. (Kemp.) 
Generic Characters. — Head with two tufts more or less elongated. Beak 
curved, bending from the base; cere large; under mandible notched; nostrils 
oval and oblique. Facial disk complete. Auditory opening large, covered 
by an operculum. Wings long; the second quill feathers generally the 
longest. Legs and toes feathered to the claws. 
CAPE EAEED OWL. 
Otus capensis. 
Otus capensis, Smith: Illus. of S. African Zoo., pi. 67. 
" HelvoluS, LlCHTENSTEIN. 
" Candida, Kaup. 
" tangitanns, Bonaparte, {par. a.) 
Specific Characters. — Quills rufous, barred broadly and tipped for an inch 
and a half with rich dark hair brown. Tail feathers marked in a similar 
way. Tarsi clothed down to toes with yellowish white feathers. First pri- 
mary shorter than second, third and fourth longer than the fifth and sixth, 
which is the shortest in the wing. Length thirteen inches. Carpus to tip 
of wing eleven inches. Tail five inches and a half. 
In the first edition I wrote as follows of this bird: — "My attention 
has been drawn by Mr. Gurney, to the following extract from "Nau- 
mannia," a German ornithological periodical, for 1852: — 
" Strix capensis, Smith, (not Lath.,) occurs as a stationary bird along 
the coast of Northern Africa, from Tangier as far as Morocco, in 
broken and marshy low grounds, exactly like our Strix brachyotus. A 
friend of mine, M. Garstensen, C. M., in Copenhagen, who was staying 
in Tangier as ornithological collector during the last winter months, 
