d who perhaps lends
me his support after his kind, is a little red owl, whose retreat is
in the heart of an old apple-tree just over the fence. Where he keeps
himself in spring and summer I do not know, but late every fall, and
at intervals all winter, his hiding-place is discovered by the jays and
nut-hatches, and proclaimed from the tree-tops for the space of half an
hour or so, with all the powers of voice they can command. Four times
during one winter they called me out to behold this little ogre feigning
sleep in his den, sometimes in one apple-tree, sometimes in another.
Whenever I heard their cries, I knew my neighbor was being berated.
The birds would take turns at looking in upon him and uttering their
alarm-notes. Every jay within hearing would come to the spot and at once
approach the hole in the trunk or limb, and with a kind of breathless
eagerness and excitement take a peep at the owl, and then join the
outcry. When I approached they would hastily take a final look and then
withdraw and regard my movements intently. After accustoming my eye to
the faint light of the cavity for a few moments, I could usually make
out the owl at the bottom feigning sleep. Feigning, I say, because this
is what he really did, as I first discovered one day when I cut into
his retreat with the axe. The loud blows and the falling chips did not
disturb him at all. When I reached in a stick and pulled him over on his
side, leaving one of his wings spread out, he made no attempt to recover
himself, but lay among the chips and fragments of decayed wood, like a
part of themselves. Indeed, it took a sharp eye to distinguish him. Nor
till I had pulled him forth by one wing, rather rudely, did he abandon
his trick of simulated sleep or death. Then, like a detected pickpocket,
he was suddenly transformed into another creature. His eyes flew wide
open, his talons clutched my finger, his ears were depressed, and every
motion and look said, "Hands off, at your peril." Finding this game did
not work, he soon began to "play 'possum" again. I put a cover over my
study wood-box and kept him captive for a week. Look in upon him any
time, night or day, and he was apparently wrapped in the profoundest
slumber; but the live mice which I put into his box from time to time
found his sleep was easily broken; there would be a sudden rustle in the
box, a faint squeak, and then silence. After a week of captivity I gave
him his freedom in the full sunshine: