GREAT HORNED-OWL. 



53 



ing to a lonely benighted traveller in the midst of an Indian wil- 

 derness. 



This species inhabits the country round Hudson's Bay; and^ 

 according to Pennant, who considers it a mere variety of the Eagle 

 Owl (Strix bubo,) of Europe, is found in Kamtschatka; extends 

 even to the arctic regions, where it is often found white ; and oc- 

 curs as low as Astrakan. It has also been seen white in the United 

 States; but this has doubtless been owing to disease or natural de- 

 fect, and not to climate. It preys on young rabbits, squirrels, rats, 

 mice, Partridges, and small birds of various kinds. It has been 

 often known to prowl about the farm house, and carry off chickens 

 from roost. A very large one, wing-broken while on a foraging 

 excursion of this kind, was kept about the house for several days, 

 and at length disappeared no one knew how. Almost every day 

 after this hens and chickens also disappeared, one by one, in an 

 unaccountable manner, till in eight or ten days very few were left 

 remaining. The fox, the minx and weasel were alternately the re- 

 puted authors of this mischief, until one morning, the old lady her- 

 self rising before day to bake, in passing towards the oven, sur- 

 prized her late prisoner the Owl regaling himself on the body of 

 a newly killed hen ! The thief instantly made for his hole under 

 the house, from whence the enraged matron soon dislodged him 

 with the brush handle, and without mercy dispatched him. In 

 this snug retreat were found the greater part of the feathers, and 

 many large fragments, of her whole family of chickens. 



There is something in the character of the Owl so recluse, 

 solitary and mysterious, something so discordant in the tones of 

 its voice, heard only amid the silence and gloom of night, and in 

 the most lonely and sequestered situations, as to have strongly im- 

 pressed the minds of mankind in general with sensations of awe 

 and abhorrence of the whole tribe. The poets have indulged freely 

 in this general prejudice; and in their descriptions and delinea- 

 tions of midnight storms and gloomy scenes of nature, the Owl is 



VOL. VI. o 



