526 NATURAL HISTORY OF BIRDS. 



are so well known that we only refer to the figure, which represents the Mexican 

 representative of our long-crested jay. The blue-colored jays are especially character- 

 istic of the New World, and lead us directly to the glorious Central and South 

 American Xanthoura jays, varied with deep black, cobalt, azure, white, yellow, and 

 green. 



The magpies may be said to differ from the jays in having much larger and more 

 graduated tails, the central pair of rectrices being usually lengthened considerably 

 beyond the rest. We may regard the so-called blue magpies (Cyanopolius) as leading 

 from the jays, though the chief interest of these birds lays in their geographical distri- 

 bution. Like most of the true magpies their home is the Old World. But while the 

 other forms have their centre of distribution in the Himalayas and the countries to 

 the southeast, the two species of Cyanopolius are restricted, one, C. cooki, to the 

 peninsula of Spain, while the other, C. cyamis, is only found in Eastern Asia, including 

 Japan ; thus these two species, which are so closely alike that it takes an expert 

 ornithologist to distinguish between them, are separated by about five thousand miles 

 of continuous land, a most unique case of discontinuous geographical distribution. 

 We said that most of the magpies are Old World birds, for the reason only that 

 representatives of the genus Pica enter the North American fauna. The reservation 

 was not made to include the long-crested and long-tailed Central American genus 



o o o 



Calocitta, which may be regarded as an extreme development of the blue-jays. We 

 even doubt the propriety of removing the Oriental genus Urocissa, created for the 

 reception of the bird figured in the accompanying cut, the red-billed blue magpie 

 ( U. erythrorhynchus) and allies from the jays. The species in question is ashy cobalt 

 blue above, whitish beneath ; head, neck, and breast, black with white markings 

 above ; tail and wings blue, marked with white ; bill coral-red, and feet orange. In 

 spite of its long tail, it is said to be quite terrestrial in its habits, and to feed almost 

 entirely on the ground. It is credited with a curious antipathy towards the leopard; 

 several of these birds, when discovering it, will follow it for more than a mile, perching 

 on the trees and bushes above it, and keeping up a continual screeching. 



But we have to return to the cut which we referred to when speaking of the 

 Sibei-ian jay, as the upper figure represents the spotted nut-cracker (Nucifraga 

 caryocatactes), a near relative of our North American Picicorvus columbianus. The 

 former has a most interesting history on account of the mystery which, until a short 

 time ago, surrounded its breeding habits, for although resident in many places in the 

 very heart of Europe, it is scarcely more than twenty years ago that the first 

 authenticated eggs of this bird were procured and described, and the search for the 

 nut-cracker's eggs is nearly a parallel to that of Wolley's search for the wax-wing's 

 eggs. The reason why this bird for so long a time eluded the efforts of the oologists 

 was the fact that it breeds very early, often before the snow melts away, and the 

 total change of the bird during the breeding season, it being then silent and shy, 

 though at other times noisy and daring. Its color is dark brown spotted with white. 



Tliis bird opens the series of the crows, which are characterized by comparatively 

 short tail, long wings, a straight, conical, and strong bill, and generally uniform black 

 plumage. This group contains the largest forms of the family ; indeed, the largest 

 passerine bird known is the rapacious and cunning raven (Corvus corax), in which the 

 family reaches its highest development. The two Palasarctic species, C. comix and. 

 C. corone, the hooded-crow and the carrion-crow of Europe, have been a source of 

 perplexity to Old World ornithologists, presenting a question similar to and nearly 



