OWLS. ' 179 



allow a close approach but its flight when flushed is by no 

 means swift. A. Whiteleyi has a cousin which takes its 

 place in North China and Manchuria. This is A. Plumipes, 

 whose legs and feet are covered with down. 



Altogether there are no fewer than 19 species of owls 

 known to visit or live in the Chinese Empire. A third Athene 

 is found in the mountai nous parts of Formosa, which geograph- 

 ically, though no longer politically, we may still be permitted 

 to name in connexion with China. Strix coromanda, or 

 Urnia coromanda has been seen near Shanghai, and one 

 specimen captured, a young bird in imperfect plumage. 

 Strix Hardwickii or Ketiipa Ceylonensis comes as far east 

 as Hongkong, where it is known as an eater of crustacean 

 and fish food. Many of the rest are little if at all known 

 so far north as this, but are more or less common farther 

 south and in the districts bordering on Burma and Tibet. 



The two species of the genus Otus known in China 

 deserve a little fuller notice. These are two of the so-called 

 eared or horned owls, a name which they ge^ from the 

 possession of feather tufts springing from the vicinity of 

 the ears, and more or less erectile at will. Ottis vulgatis, or 

 Strix otus is the long-eared owl. He is a fine handsome 

 bird. His dense black pupil is surrounded by an iris of 

 glowing yellow, and this again by a fringe of black-streaked 

 brown feathers forming the centre of the ch aracteristic 

 circular disk of feathers round every owl's ey e, the outer 

 portion of the disk being much lighter in tint. I mmediately 

 over his eyes there rise the "horns" of tawny feathers 

 streaked with black. Between the edges of the disks peeps out 

 the point of a business-like short beak. The remaining parts of 

 the body are coloured with the same tints but their mixture 

 and mottling are such as Nature's needs alone could have 

 produced. There is a tinge of blue on the upper surface of 

 the middle tail feathers. Now and then the long-eared owl 

 will come out to feed during the day, as some others of his 

 kind will do. Then he has to run the gauntlet of all the 

 little birds in the neighbourhood, whom many a time I have 

 seen and heard on such occasions exercising all the bird 

 Billingsgate they could lay their tongues to. Otus vulgaris 

 is big enough to be an enemy to rabbits and young hares, 

 besides rats, mice, voles, and small birds. Like his smaller 

 friends, too, he varies his diet with a course or two of insect 

 food. The female is sometimes 16 inches in length, her mate 

 something less. None of the owls, so far as I know, ever 

 disgrace themselves by eating carrion. They invariably kill 

 their own food, and this makes them so very useful to 

 farmers, since they destroy vast numbers of rats, mice, and 

 voles which would otherwise do immense damage. Where, 



