276 
. LETTERS FROM ALABAMA. 
turn. I wished to secure it for my collection, and 
went out for a stick to knock it down. I did not 
succeed in this, however ; hut in its alarm, it failed 
to alight as it flew against the side of the house.^ 
and fluttered to the ground, whence it could not 
easily rise. I now gave it several blows, but, being 
reluctant to give it pain, they were not sufficient to 
disable it, though they excited its pugnacity ; for 
during the infliction, it uttered several times a cry 
like the caterwauling of a cat, and repeatedly snapped 
its bill ; it showed fight^ too, by turning round and 
snapping at my fingers when I attempted to touch 
it, I seized it by one wing, and brought it into the 
school, from whence it flew out at the window, but 
soon alighting in a corner of the fence, I easily se- 
cured it. Its feeble helplessness by daylight was 
very remarkable ; by night it would doubtless have 
shot out of the ruined house on the first alarm^ 
and sailed away on smooth and easy wing, far be- 
yond reach.*^ This species, though common in the 
north, is quite a rarity in these southern regions. 
* Wilson, writing of what appears to be this same species in 
an immature condition, thus graphically alludes to its difference 
of habit by day and by night. Those who have seen this bird 
only in the day, can form but an imperfect idea of its activity, 
and even sprightliness, in its proper season of exercise. Through- 
out the day it was all stillness and gravity ; its eyelids half shut, 
its neck contracted, and its head shrunk seemingly into its body ; 
but scarcely was the sun set, and twilight began to approach, 
when its eyes became full and sparkling, like two living globes 
of fire ,* it crouched on its perch, reconnoitred every object 
around v^ith looks of eager fierceness ; alighted and fed, stood 
on the meat with clenched talons, while it tore it in morsels with 
its bill, flew round the room with the silence of thought, and 
perching, moaned out its melancholy notes, with many living 
gesticulations, not at all accordant with the pitiful tone of its 
ditty, which reminded one of the shivering meanings of a half- 
frozen puppy .” — The Red Owl, 
