A Blue Cannibal 85 



at the top of their voices, sometimes drawing me out of 

 the house to see what had gone wrong in Jaydom. They 

 seemed to be determined to attract the attention of every 

 person on the premises to the fact that they wanted that 

 morsel on the ground, but were afraid to venture down 

 after it. Perhaps they meant by their objurgations to 

 test their human neighbors, to ascertain whether any of 

 them were prowling about with a gun or a sling, ready 

 to do them harm. If there should be any such prowlers, 

 probably the jays meant to induce them to come out of 

 their ambush, to show themselves in the open, and give 

 their * jayships a chance to escape. Bird psychology, as 

 you will have occasion to. note more than once, is a good 

 deal of an enigma. How often we would give a hand- 

 some bonus to a bird if he would let us know precisely 

 what he was thinking about ! 



Although no musician, the jay has quite an extensive 

 vocal repertory. Besides his loud, challenging call, he 

 frequently utters a series of calls that have a pensive 

 quality and that fill the mind with an indefinable fore- 

 boding, especially on chill autumn days when all the 

 woods are bare and gray and the wind is moaning through 

 the boughs. Sometimes when a jay is hidden in a copse, 

 he utters a low, scolding sputter, that seems to express 

 the very quintessence of disgust. It is simply his way of 

 telling you what he thinks of a man who goes prowling 

 about without leave in the precincts of the birds. 



Have you ever heard the jay's brief musical roulade? 

 It is only a wisp of melody, rarely rich and suggestive, 



