The Ornithology of Shakespeare Part 14

The time when screech-owls cry and ban-dogs howl."

_Henry VI._ Part II. Act i. Sc. 4.

And yet, strange to say, the appearance of an owl by day is by some considered equally ominous:--

"The owl by day, If he arise, is mocked and wondered at."

_Henry VI._ Part III. Act v. Sc. 4.

"For night-owls shriek, where mounting larks should sing."

_Richard II._ Act iii. Sc. 3.

[Sidenote: ITS HABITS MISUNDERSTOOD.]

Should an owl appear at a birth it is said to forbode ill-luck to the infant. King Henry VI., addressing Gloster, says,--

"The owl shriek'd at thy birth, an evil sign."

_Henry VI._ Part III. Act v. Sc. 6.

While upon any other occasion its presence was supposed to predict a death, or at least some dire mishap:--

"The screech-owl, screeching loud, Puts the wretch, that lies in woe, In remembrance of a shroud."

_Midsummer Night's Dream_, Act v. Sc. 2.

When Richard III. is irritated by the ill-news showered thick upon him, he interrupts the third messenger with--

"Out on ye, owls! nothing but songs of death?"

_Richard III._ Act iv. Sc. 4.

It is curious how wide-spread is the superst.i.tion regarding certain birds, and particularly the owl. Even amongst the Land Dayaks of Borneo, the owl is considered a bird of ill omen. Mr. Spenser St. John, in his "Life in the Forests of the Far East," observes with regard to omens (vol. i. p. 202):--

"If a man be going on a war expedition, and has a slip during his first day's journey, he must return to his village, especially if by the accident blood be drawn, for then, should he proceed, he has no prospect but wounds or death. If the accident occur during a long expedition, he must return to his last night's resting place. In some tribes, if a deer cry near a party who are setting out on a journey, they will return. When going out at night to the jungle, if the scream of a hawk, or an owl, or of a small kind of frog be heard, it is a sign that sickness will follow if the design be pursued; and again, if the screech of the two former be heard in front of a party on the warpath, it is an evil sign, and they must return. Omens derived from the cry of birds are always sought previously to setting out on a journey, and before fixing on a spot to build new houses, or to prepare their farms."

[Sidenote: ITS UTILITY TO THE FARMER.]

Far from bringing any ill-luck to our dwellings, owls are really of the greatest service to us in destroying great numbers of vermin. A Swiss naturalist, speaking of the quant.i.ty of field-voles which are annually destroyed by owls and buzzards, says:[56]--

"C'est un fait curieux que l'homme s'acharne tout particulierement a detruire ses meillures amis, et qu'il poursuive de ses maledictions les etres qui le servent le mieux. Je joindrai donc ma faible voix a celle de bien d'autres naturalistes pour demander que l'on protege les premieres de ces betes.

"Les hibous et les chouettes, bien loin de jeter de mauvais sorts sur nos demeures, prennent au contraire, un grand soin de nos interets. Ces oiseaux exterminent, en effet, bien plus de souris que n'en pourront prendre jamais les meilleurs taupiers. Les buses n'ont nullement merite leur place sur la porte de nos granges, et plutot que de les tuer, l'on ferait bien mieux d'etablir chez nous, comme cela s'est fait avec succes dans certaines localites, de hauts perchoirs dans nos campagnes pour attirer ces oiseaux bienfaisants."

[Sidenote: A CURIOUS TRADITION.]

Among the many curious legends which exist with reference to this bird, we may mention one to which Shakespeare has alluded in Hamlet:--

"They say the owl was a baker's daughter."

_Hamlet_, Act iv. Sc. 5.

Mr. Staunton, in his edition of Shakespeare's Plays, says this has reference to a tradition still current in some parts of England. "Our Saviour went into a baker's shop where they were baking, and asked for some bread to eat. The mistress of the shop immediately put a piece of dough into the oven to bake for him, but was reprimanded by her daughter, who, insisting that the piece of dough was too large, reduced it considerably in size. The dough, however, immediately afterwards began to swell, and presently became of an enormous size. Whereupon the baker's daughter cried out, 'Wheugh! wheugh! wheugh!' which owl-like noise, it is said, probably induced our Saviour, for her wickedness, to transform her into that bird."

Mr. Douce represents this story as still current amongst the common people in Gloucestershire.[57] According to Nuttall, the north country nurses would have it that the owl was a daughter of Pharaoh, and when they heard it hoot on a winter's night, they sang to the wondering child--

"Oh! o o o, o o; I once was a king's daughter, and sat on my father's knee, But now I'm a poor hoolet, and hide in a hollow tree."

There is much difference of opinion amongst naturalists as to whether the power of hooting and shrieking is possessed by the same species. In the following pa.s.sage from _Julius Caesar_ (Act i. Sc. 3), both sounds are attributed to the same bird:--

"Yesterday the _bird of night_ did sit, Even at noonday, upon the market-place, Hooting and shrieking."

It is generally supposed that the common barn or white owl does not hoot, but only shrieks, and is, in fact, the bird always alluded to as the "screech-owl," while the brown owls (_Strix otus_, _brachyotus_, and _aluco_) are the hooters--

"The clamorous owl, that nightly hoots."

_Midsummer Night's Dream_, Act ii. Sc. 2.

But Mr. Colquhoun, speaking of the white or barn owl, says,[58] "It does hoot, but very rarely. I heard one six times in succession, and then it ceased." Sir William Jardine once shot a white owl in the act of hooting; and Mr. Boulton, of Beverley, Yorkshire, describes[59] the note of one of these birds which he had reared from the nest, and kept in confinement for fifteen months, as follows:--"It does hoot exactly like the long-eared owl, but not so frequently. I use the term 'hoot' in contradistinction to 'screech,' which it often does when irritated."

[Sidenote: NOTE OF THE OWL.]

In Gardiner's "Music of Nature" the note of the brown owl is thus rendered:--

[Music]

Mr. Colquhoun, to whom allusion has just been made, says, that the music of the white or barn owl is a little different from that of the brown owls. It is only one prolonged cadence, lower and not so mournful as that of the tawny fellow.

It would appear that owls do not keep to one note. A friend of Gilbert White's remarked that most of his owls hooted in B flat, but that one went almost half a note below A. The pipe by which he tried their notes was a common half-crown pitchpipe. A neighbour, also, of the Selborne naturalist, who was said to have a nice ear, remarked that the owls about Selborne hooted in three different keys: in G flat (or F sharp), in B flat, and A flat. He heard two hooting to each other, the one in A flat, the other in B flat.

It did not appear, however, whether the sounds proceeded from different species of brown owls, or from different individuals of the same species.

[Sidenote: AN OWL ROBBING NESTS.]

Another question in the life-history of the owl is raised by the following pa.s.sage from _Macbeth_ (Act iv. Sc. 2):--

"For the poor wren, The most diminutive of birds, will fight, Her young ones in her nest, against the owl."

This defence of their young by birds has often been noticed by Shakespeare:--

"Unreasonable creatures feed their young; And though man's face be fearful to their eyes, Yet, in protection of their tender ones, Who hath not seen them (even with those wings Which sometimes they have us'd with fearful flight) Make war with him that climb'd unto their nest, Off'ring their own lives in their young's defence?"

_Henry VI._ Part III. Act ii. Sc. 2.

[Sidenote: EVIDENCE NOT CONCLUSIVE.]