SmiGES: NOCTURNAL BIRDS OF PREY. 
499 
These are tufts of lengthened feathers rising over the eyes from the forehead, and commonly 
called ^'ear-tufts"; but they have nothing to do with the ears, and are more appropriately 
named plumicorns," or feather-horns. More reliable characters may be drawn from the 
structure of the external ear and facial disc, the modifications of which appear to bear directly 
upon mode of life ; these parts being as a rule most highly developed in the more nocturnal 
species ; some points of internal structure have been found correspondent. Thus, one group, 
of which the barn owl, Aluco fiammeiis, is the type, is very distinct in the angular contour and 
Fig. 349. — " Est illis Strigibus nomen ; sed iiominis hujus 
Causa quod liorrenda stridere nocte solcnt." — Ovid, Fasti, vi. 139. 
" Screech-oivls they 're called, because with dismal cry- 
In darkling night from place to place they fly." 
high development of the facial disc, pectination of the middle claw, and other characters upon 
which a family Aluconidm may be established. Probably the rest of the suborder fall in two 
subdivisions of a single family StrigidcE, the essential characters of which have already been 
contrasted with those of Aluconidce. 
The nearest relatives of the Striges, outside their own order, are the Caprimulgi — the 
relationship being really very close through the genus Steatornis. As is well known, owls are 
eminently nocturnal birds ; but to this rule there are numerous striking exceptions- This 
general habit is correspondent to the modification of the eyes, the size and structure of which 
