“One minute, if you please, Harry,” said Uncle Thomas; “there is another peculiarity in the structure of the Owl, of which I wish to tell you; and when I have pointed out their nice adaptation to each other, and the beautiful manner in which they all subserve the habits of the animal, I think you will admit that they are all made in wisdom. The other peculiarity to which I refer is in the plumage of the bird. The wings of some birds, as they fly along, make a whistling noise, which arises from the air acting on their hard and rigid feathers. Not so those of the Owl. The feathers of its wings are fringed with a sort of silky down, so remarkably soft and elastic that they seem scarcely to stir the air. It can thus noiselessly pounce down upon an unwary Mouse as it stirs among the leaves in the waning twilight, before it has the slightest suspicion of the presence of its enemy, who has, perhaps, been guided to the spot by the tiny stirring of a decayed leaf. You will thus perceive how the various peculiarities of which I have told you act upon each other. The Owl hears a squeak or a rustle among the leaves, and flies noiselessly to the spot; were it not, however, for the acuteness of its sight, its prey must still escape; but thus, provided, it soon spies it out and secures it. “That the ear is greatly used by the Owl in directing it to its prey,” said Uncle Thomas, “is evident, from the fact that they are frequently attracted to the spot where the rustic sportsman has stationed himself for the purpose of shooting them, by imitating the squeaking of a Mouse. “With us,” continued Uncle Thomas, “the Owl generally inhabits hollow trees, old ruins, church steeples, or the dark recesses of some uninhabited building, where it can roost undisturbed during the day. Wilson, the delightful writer from whose work I have often read to you, thus describes the haunts of the Great Tufted Owl:—‘His favourite residence is in the dark solitudes of deep swamps covered with a growth of gigantic timber; and here, as soon as the evening draws on, and mankind retire to rest; he sends forth such sounds as seem scarcely to belong to this world, startling the solitary pilgrim as he slumbers by the forest fire:— ‘Making night hideous.’ Along the mountainous shores of the Ohio, and among the deep forests of Indiana, alone, and reposing in the woods, this ghostly watchman has frequently warned me of the approach of the morning, and amused me with its singular exclamations;—sometimes sweeping down and around my fire, uttering a loud and sudden waugh O! waugh O! sufficient to have alarmed a whole garrison. He has other nocturnal solos no less melodious, one of which very much resembles the half-suppressed screams of a person suffocating or throttled, and which cannot fail of being extremely entertaining to a lonely or benighted traveller, in the midst of an Indian wilderness.’”