866 ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY. 



funeral livery ; and it seemed to me, when the clear notes of 

 the bird were echoed from hill-side to hill-side in the forest, 

 that it was wandering like a forest elf through the trees, 

 mourning the decay of all the charms that had made them 

 so beautiful through the spring and summer. 



About the first or second week in May, the Blue Jay com- 

 mences building. The nest is usually placed in a fork of a 

 low pine or cedar, in a retired locality : it is loosely con- 

 structed of twigs and coarse roots, and lined with the same 

 materials, but of a finer quality, and sometimes a few pieces 

 of moss or a few leaves. The eggs are four or five in 

 number. Their color is generally light-green, with spots of 

 light-brown ; sometimes a dirty brownish-gray, spotted with 

 different shades of brown and black. The dimensions vary 

 from 1.20 by .85 to 1 by .80 inch. But one brood is reared 

 in the season. 



PERISOREUS, BONAPARTE. 



Perisoreus, BONAPARTE, Saggio di una dist. met. (1831). (Type Corvus Cana- 

 densis?) 



Feathers lax and full, especially on the back, and of very dull colors, without 

 any blue; head without distinct crest; bill very short, broader than high; culmen 

 scarcely half the length of the head, straight to near the tip, then slightly curved; 

 gonys more curved than culmen; bill notched at tip; nostrils round, covered by 

 bristly feathers; tail about to the wings, graduated; tarsi rather short, but little 

 longer than the middle toe. 



This genus includes the species of dullest colors among all of our Jays. It has, 

 too, the shortest bill, and with this feature bears a very strong resemblance, in many 

 respects, to some of the Titmice. 



PERISOREUS CANADENSIS. Bonaparte. 

 The Canada Jay. 



Corvus Canadensis, Linnaeus. Syst. Nat., I. (1766) 158. Wils. Am. Orn., III. 

 (1811) 33. Aud. Orn. Biog., II. (1834) 53; V. (1839) 208. 



Perisoreus Canadensis, Bonaparte. List (1838). lb. t Consp. (1850) 375. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Tail graduated; lateral feathers about one inch shortest; wings a little shorter 

 than the tail; head and neck, and forepart of the breast, white; a plumbeous brown 

 nuchal patch, becoming darker behind, from the middle of the crown to the back, 

 from which it is separated by an interrupted whitish color; rest of upper parts ashy- 



