BLACKGAME. OWLS 301 



A,N, to J. A, Harvie-Brown : — 



10, Beaufort Gardens, S.W. 



January 10, 1877. 



It is quite a new notion to me that the Capercally 

 drives out the Blackgame. Without intimating any 

 doubt — because indeed I am not in a position to doubt 

 or to believe — I will, however, ask you to be fully satis- 

 fied that this is the case. I know how fond game- 

 keepers and others are of imagining that such or such a 

 thing has caused a diminution of game. Thus it has 

 grown to be a prevalent belief in Norfolk and Suffolk 

 that French Partridges drive away the grey birds. I in 

 former years had ample opportunity of seeing both 

 species and made pretty good use of it, and I am con- 

 vinced that the belief has not a particle of foundation. 

 Again I know from experience in Dorsetshire that in 

 some seasons Blackgame are unaccountably scarce and 

 in others unaccountably plentiful, and there there are no 

 Capercallies at all. 



I am just returned from Brighton where I saw 

 Mr. Booth's collection. He seems to have murdered 

 several Eagles last spring at their nests ! 



Bloxworth, September 20, 1877, 



Dear Lilford, 



Concerning Owls : both last year and this I 

 have been exercised in regard to an Owl that comes and 

 hoots in trees near this house. On more than one 

 occasion last year my brother Edward and myself saw 

 a Barn Owl fly from a tree whence such hooting had 

 been heard but a few minutes before, and no Brown 

 Owl could be found in or flushed from the said tree. Is 

 it possible that after all the Barn Owl may hoot after a 

 fashion; for I ought to say that this note is not the 

 regular " Tu-whit, Tu-whoo," but a wavering " whoo- 

 yoo-o-yoo-yoo," preceded and followed by horrid and 

 unholy shrieks ? 



I won't have that Durham Canon arrogate " Tit- 

 mousen " to himself. He only heard it from me {vide 



