1054 Birds, 



over the fields, like a hound in search of game, or it is a corruption 

 of harrower, from the verb harrow, to pillage, strip, or tear up ; or 

 from the Scotch word harry, which is derived from the old French 

 harer, to rob. It is worthy of remark, that the head of the female (the 

 ringtail) resembles, more perhaps than any of our other buzzards, that 

 of an owl, having much the same disk of circularly disposed feathers 

 on each side of the head. 



Montagu's Harrier, Cercus Montagui. " A pair of these birds was 

 shot near Guisborough. They are now in the collection of Mr. C. 

 Newby, at Stockton." — J. G. 



Scops Eared Owl, Scops Aldrovandi. This very rare and migrato- 

 ry species was recorded by me, from the information of Mr. Winch, 

 as having been known to breed in Castle Eden Dene, (see Appendix 

 Hist. Stock, p. 14). Scops, or Xkco-^, is evidently derived from auia, 

 and wij/, i. e. the power of seeing in the shade or dark. 



The old writers named the appendages on the head, horns in the 

 Bubo and Scops, and ears in the two species of Otus. 



Long-eared Owl, Olus vulgaris. By no means common just here : 

 but it frequents the more wooded places, and lives chiefly in old trees. 

 Mr. J. Grey has a well- stuffed individual, which was shot in the Wyn- 

 yard woods. 



Short-eared Owl, Woodcock Owl, Otus brachyotos. It has received 

 its latter trivial name with us in the north of England, because it ap- 

 pears there about the 20th of October, the period of the arrival of the 

 woodcock ; and is supposed to migrate, like it, from Norway, and 

 other parts of Scandinavia. It inhabits thick grass, whins and hedges 

 in fields, and remains the whole winter, preying chiefly on field-mice 

 and rats. It is a handsome bird, and rather tame. 



Barn Owl, Strix Jlammea. The fascial disk in the present bird is 

 large and strongly marked. This, together with the height of brow 

 projecting above the eyes, gives to most of the owls a very solemn, 

 sagacious and intelligent aspect, and has therefore caused them to be 

 considered as the birds of wisdom, and to have been held, from a very 

 early period by the Athenians, as sacred to Minerva, and the emblem 

 of their own city, and which they placed upon their coins, sculptures 

 and paintings. The barn-owl is a widely distributed species, being 

 found in America and throughout Africa : it appears frequently in the 

 painted hieroglyphics and sculptures of Egypt. 



Tawny Owl, Syrnium stridulum. The preceding and this species 

 do great service to the farmer in clearing his fields of the Muridac 

 and Castoridae. 



