112 
STRIX FLAMMEA. 
and was once caught in a barn in my neighbourhood. 
European writers inform us, that it makes no nest, but 
deposits its eggs in the holes of walls, and lays five or 
six, of a whitish colour ; is said to feed on mice and 
small birds, which, like the most of its tribe, it swallows 
whole, and afterwards emits the bones, feathers, and 
other indigestible parts, at its mouth, in the form of 
small round cakes, which are often found in the empty 
buildings it frequents. During its repose it is said to 
make a blowing noise resembling the snoring of a man. # 
It is distinguished in England by various names, the 
barn owl, the church owl, gi Hi how let, and screech owl. 
In the lowlands of Scotland it is universally called the 
hoolet. 
The white or barn owl is fourteen inches long, and 
upwards of three feet six inches in extent ; bill, a 
whitish horn colour, longer than is usual among its 
tribe ; space surrounding each eye remarkably concave, 
the radiating feathers meeting in a high projecting 
ridge, arching from the bill upwards; between these 
lies a thick tuft of bright tawny feathers, that are 
scarcely seen, unless the ridges be separated; face, 
white, surrounded by a border of narrow thickset vel- 
vety feathers, of a reddish cream colour at the tip, pure 
silvery white below, and finely shafted with black; 
whole upper parts, a bright tawny yellow, thickly 
sprinkled with whitish and pale purple, and beautifully 
interspersed with larger drops of white, each feather of 
the back and wing-coverts ending in an oblong spot of 
white bounded by black ; head, large, tumid ; sides of 
the neck, pale yellow ochre, thinly sprinkled with small 
touches of dusky ; primaries and secondaries the same, 
thinly barred, and thickly sprinkled with dull purplish 
brown ; tail, two inches shorter than the tips of the 
wings, even, or very slightly forked, pale yellowish, 
crossed with five bars of brown, and thickly dotted with 
the same ; whole lower parts, pure white, thinly inter- 
spersed with small round spots of blackish ; thighs, the 
* Bewick, I, p. 20. 
