302 LITTLE OWL. 
Mediterranean. Examples from Greece are paler than those from 
Western Europe ; and an increase in sandy tint has led to the separa- 
tion of the form which inhabits North Africa and Egypt as A. glaux 
or A. meridionalis. Other variations in tone are found in South 
Russia and in Asia Minor; while between the Ural Mountains and 
Northern China there is a fairly distinct species, 4. dactriana, which 
has the toes covered with feathers instead of hairy bristles. 
In April or May the Little Owl deposits its 3-5 white eggs in holes 
in ruins, farm out-houses and other buildings, hollow trees, disused 
rabbit-burrows, or rocks: measurements 1°4 by 1°15 in. Mr. 
Meade-Waldo informs me that incubation lasts twenty-eight days ; 
that the bird feeds largely on insects, and frequents lawns in the 
evening to collect earth-worms ; while in winter it catches birds at 
roost, and devours a large number of Thrushes ; eating also mice 
and other small mammals. Early in the spring the male is very 
noisy, and repeats its note of cz or sometimes cu-cz, with exasperating 
monotony, and I have heard it do so again in autumn. This Owl 
is comparatively diurnal, and is therefore liable to be mobbed by 
small birds; for which reason it is often used as a lure by Con- 
tinental bird-catchers. Its habit of alternately ducking down and 
drawing itself up to its full height is extremely grotesque. 
The adult has the upper plumage brown, with triangular white 
stripes on the head, white spots on the nape and wings, and four 
bands of dull white on the tail; under parts dull white streaked 
with brown; facial disk greyish-white and ill-defined; no oper- 
culum ; irides yellow; toes covered with hairy bristles. Length : 
male 9 in., wing 6 in.; female 9°5 in., wing 6°5 in. The young 
have a more rufous tinge than the adults. 
According to the least elastic interpretation of the often dis- 
regarded laws of nomenclature, the generic name A¢hene is inadmis- 
sible, inasmuch as it has been previously employed in Entomology, 
and Carine should therefore be adopted ; but many will agree with 
me that the point should be conceded, if only to preserve an associa- 
tion with Pallas Athéné, to whom this bird was sacred. The specific 
name passerina, sometimes employed, is distinctly inadmissible ; for 
the Strix passerina of Linnzeus (Glaucidium passerinum of recent 
systematists) is the Pigmy Owl, a bird hardly larger than a Sparrow, 
and one which has never occurred in the British Islands, nor is 
likely to occur, unless introduced. 
