THE WAYS OF JAYS 13 



take aim, and then, with a flash of wings, sprang at its sup- 

 posed enemy. What followed, the camera, although set for 

 a hundredth part of a second, failed definitely to record. 

 The heart of the little pine seemed rent by the explosion of 

 a Blue J ay. It was no feint, but a good, honest blow deliver- 

 ed with all the bird 's force of body and pinion, and the poor 

 little Owl was completely vanquished, upset, at the first on- 

 slaught. The J ay had given a most convincing exhibition 

 of the highest type of courage ; it had mastered its fears and 

 deliberately gone to battle, I felt like applauding. 



But its troubles were not ended. This was a peculiar 

 kind of Owl, different, doubtless, from any that the J ay had 

 ever before encountered. It was conquered, but instead of 

 Hying away to some dark nook to nurse its wounds, it per- 

 sisted in remaining on the field, retaining its grasp of the 

 limb, not upright, however, but hanging upside down, as no 

 Owl was ever seen to do before, and, indeed, as only wired 

 Owls could. Such unheard-of behavior excited the Jays 

 even more than the Owl 's first appearance and, from near- 

 by limbs, they shrieked notes of defiance until, in mercy to 

 their throats and my ears, I removed the cause of their 

 alarm, bent the branches back to conceal their nest, and left 

 them to discuss their remarkable experience at their leisure. 

 Ten days later, when I parted the pine-boughs, I could 

 with difficulty believe that I saw the same nest. In place of 

 five skinny, naked, sightless, squirming creatures, were five 

 plump, well-feathered, bright-eyed birds almost as large as 

 their parents. They had grown mentally as well. The 

 sense of fear had developed and, as I looked at them, with a 

 common impulse they jumped from the edge of the nest and 

 fluttered to the ground below. Disregarding the protests of 

 their parents, I gathered them together, placed them in a 

 row on the limb of a neighboring pine, and then addressed 

 them in what I esteemed to be the tongue of their tribe. 



Perchance in this narrative both the speech and the ac- 

 tions of Jays have been misinterpreted, but in this conclud- 



