BIEDS AND POETS 25 



man and picturesque bird; then he belongs to the 

 night and its weird effects. Bird of the silent 

 wing and expansive eye, grimalkin in feathers, fe- 

 line, mousing, haunting ruins and towers, and mock- 

 ing the midnight stillness with thy uncanny cry! 

 The owl is the great bugaboo of the feathered 

 tribes. His appearance by day is hailed by shouts 

 of alarm and derision from nearly every bird that 

 flies, from crows down to sparrows. They swarm 

 about him like flies, and literally mob him back into 

 his dusky retreat. Silence is as the breath of his 

 nostrils to him, and the uproar that greets him 

 when he emerges into the open day seems to alarm 

 and confuse him as it does the pickpocket when 

 everybody cries Thief. 



But the poets, I say, have not despised him : — 



" The lark is but a bumpkin fowl ; 

 He sleeps in his nest till mom ; 

 But my blessing upon the jolly owl 

 That all night blows his horn." 



Both Shakespeare and Tennyson have made songs 

 about him. This is Shakespeare's, from "Love's 

 Labor's Lost," and perhaps has reference to the 

 white or snowy owl : — 



" When icicles hang by the wall, 



And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, 

 And Tom bears logs into the hall, 



And milk comes frozen home in pail ; 

 When blood is nipped and ways be foul, 

 Then nightly sings the staring owl, 



Tu-whoo ! 

 Tu-whit ! tu-whoo ! a merry note, 

 While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 



