320 The Htflory of ANIMAL 8. 
The legs are long and very robuft; the claws are large, black, fharp, and 
crooked ; when fully exerted, they make a very formidable appearance: the feet are 
feathered down to the extremities of the toes, and the covering plumes are of a mixed 
whitifh and reddifh-brown colour. 
The tail is longer than the wings, and is variegated with feveral dufky brown 
fafciae ; the wings are not fafciated, but they are variegated with black fpots, and there 
are fome black, tranfverfe, undulated lines, and fome larger, longitudinal, black ones 
alfo on the body: the iris of the eye is of a fine orange yellow, and there is no cera 
or membrane at the bafe of the beak, but the whifkers already defcribed fupply it’s 
place : the plumage that covers the legs is rather like the down of fome quadrupeds, 
than of the regular figure of feathers. 
This is a native of the Northern Countries. It is frequent in Norway, Denmark, 
and Sweden, and has been feen wild in England about the Suffex coaft, and near fome 
of the high cliffs in Scotland: it generally lives in thick woods, or among rocks, and 
fometimes builds among ruins, though more frequently in the high rocky cliffs. It 
is a very bold bird, and feizes not only leffer birds, but hares, rabbits, and any kind 
of fmall quadrupeds. It preys like the other owls by night, and in the the time of 
breeding it's young is fo voracious, as to do infinite mifchief in the neighbourhood of 
the places where it builds. Gefner calls it Bubo primus; Bellonius, Bubo 5 and moft 
of the other writers have taken the one or the other of thefe names. 
Strix capite aurito , corpora albido. 50)0 UUh H)!)ttC 
The white , aurited Strix . 
This alfo i9 an extreamly beautiful bird, but it is much more fcarce than the former. 
It is equal to a turky in fize, and is of a beautiful fnow-white colour, elegantly varie¬ 
gated with fpots and lines of black : the head is large, rounded, fhort, and decorated 
in a very beautiful manner, with a pair of ears or horns, as they are ufually called; 
they are tufts of eredt feathers, having their origin from the verges of the apertures of 
the ears: the large feathers of the wings are of a fnow-white, with a few black va¬ 
riegations ; the tail alfo is white, and has a few oblong, black variegations: the varie¬ 
gations of black on the body are principally alfo oblong, fome of them are tranfverfe, 
and others longitudinal; and fome are plane, others undulated. 
The legs are very robuft and long; the claws are very fharp, long, and formidable. 
This fpecies is a native only of the coldeft climates: there was one of them fhewn 
alive fome years ago in London ; it had been brought over by the people concerned in 
the Greenland fifhery. Few of the Ornithologifts have defcribed it. Rudbeck calls 
it Nodtua Scandiana marina et albo ex cinereo variegata, but the fpots on that I faw 
were black. 
Strix capite aurito pennis fix. 3 £f)t Itfttt 
The Strix, with the head aurited with fix feathers. 
This is a very beautiful bird, but vaftly inferior to either of the preceding in fize : 
it is equal to a large pigeon, and it’s weight is about three quarters of a pound : 
the wings are very large, and, when fully extended, meafure, from tip to tip, 
more than three times the length of the body : the beak is black, moderately large 
and hooked ; the tongue is thick, and fomewhat bifid ; the head is fhort and rounded, 
and the whole face has an agreeable, though a very fierce afpedt: the eyes are large, 
and their iris is of a very beautiful yellow : the ears are long and beautiful; there runs 
a circle or ring round the face, marking it’s outline ; this confifts of a double feries of 
feathers: the exterior confifts of feathers which have very elegant variegadons, in lit¬ 
tle lines of yellowifh, brownifh, blackifh, and white; the interior is almoft entirely 
of a reddifh-brown, but, where they meet, they are both black at the edges. 
The feathers on the lower part of the belly are of a beautiful reddifh-brown, and 
a plumage of the fame colour is continued down the legs, quite to the toes: thofe on 
the breaft and the middle of the throat are black, but they have variegations of white, 
and of a reddifh-brown about their edges: thofe on the under part of the wings are 
reddifh, and toward the bafes of the primary remiges or wing-feathers there are black 
fpots, one to each feather ; thefe are oblong and large : there is alfo another very large 
r black 
