Page:Ornithological biography, or an account of the habits of the birds of the United States of America, vol 2.djvu/440

404 ©al department, and who, I believe, has written an excellent account of the eastern portion of the peninsula of the Floridas.

Having arrived at Charleston, South Carolina, in October 1833, as soon as my family and myself were settled in the house of my friend the Reverend John Bachman, I received information that a pair of Owls (of the present species) had a nest in the upper story of an abandoned sugar-house in the city, when I immediately proceeded to the place, ac- tompanied by Dr Samuel Wilson and William Kunhardt, Esq. We ascended cautiously to the place, I having pulled off my boots to pre- vent noise. When we reached it I found a sort of large garret filled with sugar-moulds, and lighted by several windows, one of which had two panes broken. I at once discovered the spot where the Owls were, by the hissing sounds of the young ones, and approached slowly and cautiously towards them, until within a few feet, when the parent bird seeing me, flew quickly toward the window, touched the frame of the broken panes, and glided silently through the aperture. I could not even afterwards observe the course of its flight. The young were three in number, and covered with down of a rich cream colour. They raised themselves on their legs, appeared to swell, and emitted a constant hiss- ing sound, somewhat resembling that of a large snake when angry. They continued thus without altering their position, during the whole of our stay, which lasted about twenty minutes. They were on a scattered parcel of bits of straw, and surrounded by a bank made of their ejected peUets. Very few marks of their excrements were on the floor, and they were beautifully clean. A Cotton Rat, newly caught, and still entire, lay beside them, and must have been brought from a distance of several miles, that animal abounding in the rice-fields, none of which, I believe, are nearer than three or four miles. After making some arrangements with the Negro man who kept the house, we returned home. The eggs from which these young Owls had been hatched must have been laid six weeks before this date, or about the 15th of September.

On the 25th of November they had grown much in size, but none of the feathers had yet made their appearance, excepting the primaries, which were now about an inch long, thick, full of blood, and so tender that the least pressure of the fingers might have burst them. As the young grow more and more, the parents feed and attend to them less frequently than when very small, coming to them in the night only with food. This proves the caution of these birds in avoiding danger, and the faculty