62 ON THE BEACH AT DAYTONA. 
brought the youngsters up to the doorstep 
as a matter of course. 
The Florida jay, a bird of the scrub, is 
not to be confounded with the Florida blue 
jay (a smaller and less conspicuously crested 
duplicate of our common Northern bird), 
to which it bears little resemblance either 
in personal appearance or in voice. Seen 
from behind, its aspect is peculiarly strik- 
ing; the head, wings, rump, and tail being 
dark blue, with an almost rectangular patch 
of gray set in the midst. Its beak is very ~ 
stout, and its tail very long; and though it 
would attract attention anywhere, it,is hardly 
to be called handsome or graceful. Its 
notes — such of them as I heard, that is — 
are mostly guttural, with little or nothing of 
the screaming quality which distinguishes 
the blue jay’s voice. To my ear they were 
often suggestive of the Northern shrike. 
On the 23d of February I was standing 
on the rear piazza of one of the cottages, 
when a jay flew into the oak and palmetto 
scrub close by. A second glance, and I saw 
that she was busy upon a nest. When she 
had gone, I moved nearer, and waited. She 
did not return, and I descended the steps 
