V °',8$> 111 ] Miller, New -Jay from Mexico. 35 



pileum, and sides of neck pale glaucous blue ; cheeks and auriculars 

 brownish slightly tinged with blue; wings blue of a shade somewhat 

 darker than that of head, the night feathers brownish on the inner webs 

 and gray beneath; tail like wings, but the feathers showing faint trans- 

 verse darker bars when held in certain lights, and blue extending over 

 most of inner webs; whole ventral surface of body pale drab gray without 

 trace of blue, darker across chest and on thighs, lading lo dirty white on 

 belly and crissum ; feet and bill black, the latter marked with pale horn 

 color at tip and along cutting edges from base to region about opposite 

 nostrils. 



None of the eleven specimens of Aphelocoma couchi that 1 have 

 seen are near enough to A. gracilis, either in size or color, to 

 cause any difficulty in distinguishing the two birds. The blue on 

 the head, wings, tail, and upper tail-coverts is darker and much 

 more intense in A. couchi than in A. gracilis, while in unworn 

 specimens of the former the blue of the back is only just per- 

 ceptibly dulled with gray. In the type, however, which was killed 

 in April, the plumage is so much abraded that the color is much 

 grayer than in fresh autumnal skins. The type of A. gracilis, 

 taken in February, is apparently unworn, yet the back is notice- 

 ably grayer than in the type of A. couchi, and entirely different 

 from fresh specimens of the latter. In Aphelocoma couchi the 

 cheeks are either concolor with the pileum or so slightly tinged 

 with brown as to make no strong contrast. In A. gracilis, on the 

 other hand, the cheeks are noticeably browner than the pileum. 

 The gray of the chest and thighs is in A. couchi always strongly 

 tinged with blue (except in much worn specimens), while in 

 A. gracilis it is entirely unmixed with this color. The bill of 

 A. couchi varies considerably in shape, in immature birds appear- 

 ing shorter and thicker than in the adults, but never approaches 

 the weak slender bill of A. gracilis. In A. couchi the bill is 

 entirely deep blue black except at the tip where it is pale horn 

 color. In A. gracilis, on the other hand, the cutting edges from 

 the base to near the middle are pale horn color like the tip. No 

 trace of such marking can be seen in any of the specimens of 

 A. couchi, although the series represents all ages from the adult to 

 young not wholly moulted from the first plumage. The feet of 

 the two birds differ greatly in size though not in the proportion 

 of the various parts. The accompanying drawings show the 



