278
Concord, Mass.
1898.
October 16
 Clear and cool with violent N.W. wind.
 I left the Keyes' this morning and sent
my effects by team to the cabin sailing down
myself in the old Rushton canoe. Al[?] joined
me at 10 A.M. and we drove together to the
Barrett farm returning to the cabin for dinner.
  In the afternoon we took a long walk in
the woods. Small birds were scarce apparently
but we started several Partridges and a
Great Horned Owl. The latter we found first
in the Prescott woods but we saw it afterwards
on Davis's Hill & Benson's pine ridge. It was
as shy as any Hawk starting out of gun range
and taking long flights although the afternoon
was bright & clear. At about 7 P.M. either
the same bird or another visited Ball's Hill
and called for several minutes in one of the
trees on the ridge directly behind the cabin.
It gave the short, choking cry peculiar, I believe,
to young Great Horned Owls. Gilbert thought this
note very cat-like. We both wondered whether
or no the bird was the same that we
missed here last spring & afterwards liberated
in the Prescott woods. It must have been
one of the pair scared in Lawrence's woods.
[margin]Bubo vir.[/margin]