SHORT-EARED OWL. 225 



and preys by day, like a Hawk. I have also re- 

 ceived this species from Lancashire, which is a 

 hilly and wooded country; and my friends have 

 also sent it from New England and Newfound- 

 land." 



The Count de Buffon, erroneously supposing a 

 figure of this species in the folio edition of the 

 British Zoology to be intended for a very different 

 bird, expresses himself on the subject of that work 

 in general, and of the description and figure of this 

 species in particular, with a degree of indecorous 

 criticism bordering on rude invective. Fie com- 

 plains indeed with some degree of justice that the 

 figures representing not only this bird, but the 

 former, or Long-Eared Owl, are ill executed, and 

 convey a wrong idea of the lengthened feathers or 

 ears, which in these figures have a thick and fleshy^ 

 rather than feathery appearance; but the remain- 

 ing part of his criticism must be allowed to recoil 

 on himself, and is entirely owing to his not having 

 perceived that the bird then first mentioned by 

 Mr. Pennant was, in reality, a species before un- 

 distinguished by naturalists, or confounded with 

 some other birds of this genus. 



Mr. Pennant, in his " Literary Life," hints at 

 this circumstance, and imputes the Count's freedom 

 of expression to a comparison made in the British 

 Zoology between the free-thinking Frenchman 

 and our own illustrious countryman Ray, much to 

 the advantage of the latter. Mr. Pennant also, in 

 his Catalogue of the work entitled Planches En- 

 luminets^ published as a companion to the Histoire 



V. vir. 15 



