66 . CHARACTER IN FEATHERS. 



political life, when a man of brilliant n?itural 

 endowments has yielded to low ambitions and 

 stooped to unworthy means, till what was 

 meant to be a statesman turns out to be a dem- 

 agogue. But perhaps we wrong our handsome 

 friend, fallen angel though he be, to speak thus 

 of him. Most likely he would resent the com- 

 parison, and I do not press it. We must admit 

 that juvenile sportsmen have persecuted him 

 unduly ; and when a creature cannot show him- 

 self without being shot at, he may be pardoned 

 for a little misanthropy. Christians as we are, 

 how many of us could stand such a test ? In 

 these circumstances, it is a point in the jay's 

 favor that he still has, what is rare with birds, 

 a sense of humor, albeit it is humor of a rather 

 grim sort, — the sort which expends itself in 

 practical jokes and uncivil epithets. He has 

 discovered the school-boy's secret : that for the 

 expression of unadulterated derision there is 

 nothing like the short sound of a, prolonged 

 into a drawl. Ydh^ yah., he cries ; and some- 

 times, as you enter the woods, you may hear 

 him shouting so as to be heard for half a mile, 

 " Here conies a fool with a gun ; look out for 

 him ! " 



It is natural to think of the shrike in connec- 

 tion with the jay, but the two have points of 

 unlikeness no less than of resemblance. The 



