SOME MINOR SONG-BIRDS. 155 
One morning about sunrise, as I sat bya 
window, writing, I heard the mother-bird 
“chipping” dolefully, and I looked out just 
in time to see a blue-jay kill, by a deft turn 
of its powerful bill, the last remaining fledgling 
of the brood. ‘The assassin then proceeded 
to tear up the tiny nest, after which he very 
perfunctorily flew away! Here was a case of 
utter depravity—a piece of unmitigated out- 
rage for which there could have been no mo- 
tive aside from the impulse of a viciousness 
incomparable. I went to the spot, and found 
the young sparrows scattered on the ground, 
dead in the midst of the shreds of the nest. 
Each bird bore the livid pincer-like impres- 
sion of the jay’s beak. I cannot account for 
this well-known brutality of the jay ; it does not 
appear to be always present with it, for I have 
known it to live in perfect peace with other birds, 
nesting in the same orchard and even in the 
same tree. Its colors and its restless activity 
make the blue-jay one of the most valuable 
elements of almost every bit of thicket or 
hedge throughout our Middle and Southern 
States for nearly the whole year. 
Iam aware that many objections may be 
urged to putting so harsh a screecher in the 
catalogue of music-making birds; but it can 
and does occasionally sing most superbly. 
Moreover, upon being dissected, the blue-jay’s 
throat shows a very high state of development, 
the muscular arrangement of the lower larynx 
bearing every sign of great flexibility and of 
delicate adjustment. It is a hardy bird, often 
met with in midwinter far north of the fortieth 
degree of latitude, apparently quite happy 
among the sleety and snowy branches of the 
