“The smallest of our hornless owls is the sparrow-owl. Like the red owl, it is about the size of a blackbird. It is dark brown in color, with large white spots of a round or oval shape. The throat is white, and the tail is crossed by four narrow whitish stripes. The sparrow-owl has a quick and light bearing, and it sees by day much better than other night birds; therefore it sometimes chases small birds, but rarely with success. When it has the good luck to catch one it plucks it very clean before eating it, instead of following the gluttonous example of the horned owls and the howlet, which swallow such prey whole and throw the feathers up later. Its hunting expeditions are much more fruitful when directed against field-mice and common mice, which it dismembers before eating. Other owls make but one mouthful of their prey; the sparrow-owl tears to pieces the animal it has caught, perhaps so that it may enjoy the flavor more. To express astonishment, surprise, fear, the barn-owl waddles in a most ridiculous manner; but the sparrow-owl adopts another method: it bows its legs, crouches down, and then abruptly rises, lengthening its neck and turning its head to right and left. You would say it was moved by springs from within. This performance is repeated over and over again, each time accompanied by a clacking of the beak. In flight the bird’s habitual cry is poo, poo, poo; at rest it says ay-may, aid-may, repeated several times in quick succession in a tone almost human. “The sparrow-owl lives in deserted buildings, quarries, old and dilapidated towers, but never in hollow trees. It frequents the roofs of churches and of village houses. Its nest consists of a hole in a rock or a wall, where it lays four or five round white eggs somewhat speckled with red.” CHAPTER XVII THE EAGLE “If it were my purpose to give you a systematic and scientific account of birds, instead of acquainting you with the various species useful to agriculture, I ought to have begun with birds that hunt by day and to have postponed my talks on those that hunt by night; in other words, the eagle, the falcon, and the hawk should have been described first. But should you ask me why, I should be rather at a loss for a satisfactory answer. For want of a better let us content ourselves with this one: the first do their work by day, the second at night. But the eagle and the others of that group live at our expense, while the horned owl and its kind render us a great service by holding in check what would else be a disastrous multiplication of rodents. Consequently, in point of usefulness, the night-bird comes first.