101 
of a Type to Linncean Genera. 
ence to that number. Turning thereto we further read/' Ha¬ 
bitat in sylvis frequens per Sueciam and then, coming to the 
second edition of the 'Fauna' (1761), we have (p. 26) :— 
" 77. Strix Stridula [.], Fn. 55." 
—this being Linnseus's mode of quoting the former edition of 
his work, and one more addition:— 
" Svecis Skrik Uggla." 
Now no one can doubt what Linnseus meant by this bird. 
His diagnosis may not be the most accurate; but the " Skrik 
Uggla" of the Swedes, the Owl which is common in the 
forests throughout Sweden—that is, except in the then little- 
known north of that country—is just as surely our Brown or 
Tawny Owl as Brisson's " Chathuant" is. Thus the last, or 
Brisson's type of Strix, is also the S. stridula of Linnseus ; for 
I need not say that in both of the subsequent editions of the 
' Systema Naturae' (10th and 12th) the same species retains 
that name; but I must add that if there be any truth in the 
opinions I have above advanced, this, and this only, can be 
interpreted as the Linnsean type of the genus Strix; for, as 
Linnseus himself rightly states, it is emphatically the " Strix " 
of Gesner, of Aldrovandus, of Willughby, and of Ray. 
Finally, to clinch the whole matter, Linnseus himself asserts 
in the 12th edition that it is the " Strix " of Brisson. 
In rectifying my error, I wish it were possible for me to prove 
as clearly what the S. aluco of Linnseus really was; but the 
matter does not very much signify, and it will be unnecessary 
for me here to repeat each step of the investigation. A very 
little trouble will show that this species is founded upon 
an Owl which, he tells us (CElandska och Gothlandska Resa, 
p. 69), he, on the 5th of June, 1741, had an opportunity of 
describing at the woodman's [hos Skogwachtaren) at Ahrby, 
in the south of CEland; and the description which he there 
gives is but a briefer form of that which appeared five years 
afterwards in the 'Fauna.' I express no very decided opinion; 
but my impression is that the bird was most likely a Barn- 
Owl*, a species known to be rare in Sweden and its islands, 
* He writes “ Remiges 1. 2. 3. sensim breviores.” Now this is not ab¬ 
solutely true of the Barn-Owl, wherein the second primary is longer than 
