LITTLE OWL. 151 
bird will by this means entrap itself when endeavouring 
to come out for the evening. It is much used on the 
Continent as a decoy to entrap small birds.” M. Vieillot 
says it is seldom found in forests. 
The actions of a specimen kept for more than two years 
by Mr. Leadbeater of Brewer-street were singularly gro- 
tesque and amusing. 
Edwards drew his figure of this Little Owl, plate 228, 
from a specimen caught alive in a chimney in London ; 
and a second example was taken about the same time in 
a similar situation, in the parish of Lambeth. Scopoli 
says it builds in chimneys in Carniola. Mr. Rennie, in a 
note to a recent edition of White’s Selborne, says, ‘“ I re- 
collect seeing in Wiltshire the remains of a specimen of 
the rare Sparrow-Owl, Striv passerina, nailed up to a barn- 
door.” —Page 34. Two specimens, according to Dr. Moore, 
have occurred in Devonshire: Montagu has also men- 
tioned one in the same county. My friend Mr. T. C. 
HKyton sent me a notice of one taken near Bristol ; Dr. 
Hastings mentions one instance of the occurrence of this 
bird in Worcestershire ; and Pennant speaks of one taken 
in Flintshire. In a direction north of London, Mr. Hunt 
of Norwich, in his British Ornithology, says, ‘* We re- 
collect a nest of these birds bemg taken at no great dis- 
tance from Norwich ;” and Mr. Paget, in the Sketch of 
the Natural History of Yarmouth, mentions two speci- 
mens as well authenticated. The Little Owl has occurred 
in Yorkshire; and the woodcut in Mr. Bewick’s work 
was taken from a drawing of a specimen shot at Wid- 
rington in Northumberland, in January 1813. M. Tem- 
minck says this species does not go beyond the 55th de- 
gree of North latitude. It is common in Germany and 
Holland, visits Spain and the Morea, and, according to 
Mr. Strickland, is common in the Leyant. 
