INTERVIEW WITH THE BLUE JAY. 147 



keep them on his. All this time he did not 

 utter a sound, but studied me as closely, and 

 to all appearances as carefully, as ever I had 

 studied him. Obviously he was in doubt what 

 manner of creature it was, so like the human 

 race, yet so unaccountably quiet. He tried 

 to be unconcerned, while still not releasing me 

 from strict surveillance ; he dressed his feathers 

 a little, uttering a soft whisper to himself, as if 

 he said, " Well, I never ! " then looked me over 

 again more carefully than before. This panto- 

 mime went on for half an hour or more ; and no 

 one who had looked for that length of time into 

 the eyes of a blue jay could doubt his intelli- 

 gence, or that he had his thoughts and his well- 

 defined opinions, that he had studied his ob- 

 server very much as she had studied him, and 

 that she had not fooled him in the least. 



The little boy blue is one of the birds suffer- 

 ing under a bad name whom I have wished to 

 know better, to see if perchance something might 

 be done to clear up his reputation a bit. I am 

 not able to say that he never steals the eggs of 

 other birds, though during nearly a month of 

 hard work, when, if ever, a few eggs would have 

 been a welcome addition to his resources, and 

 sparrows were sitting in scores on the place, I 

 did not see or hear anything of the sort. I 

 have heard of his destroying the nest, and pre- 



