188 BIRDS OF THE WEST OF SCOTLAND. 



Jay is much less frequently observed. All the noise it makes comes 

 from thick plantations, where one can scarcely catch a glimpse of 

 it ; and when two or three are scolding together, they stop at once 

 on hearing the approach of an enemy, and glide quietly through 

 the thicket until they can renew the disturbance in a safer place. 

 I have heard this bird, when in a tuneful mood, give utterance to 

 a subdued and pleasing kind of chatter, but the usual note, or 

 rather scream, of the Jay is perhaps the most discordant sound 

 to be heard in our woods. In the early part of the summer it 

 usually feeds upon insects and worms a diet which it varies, 

 perhaps oftener than is agreeable, by helping itself to garden pro- 

 duce. Beans, peas, and cherries seem to be more attractive than 

 other seeds or fruits; and when these fail, it partakes freely of 

 acorns and beech nuts. Nor does it scruple to pillage the nests of 

 the smaller birds eggs and callow young sharing a like fate. 



The blue patch on the wing of this bold plunderer is much 

 valued by anglers for dressing artificial flies. 



THE NUTCRACKER. 



NUCIFRAGA CARYOCATACTES. 



As a Scottish species I had originally inserted the Nutcracker here 

 on the authority of the late Dr Macgillivray, who states in his 

 work on British Birds that, in addition to the, Scottish speci- 

 men in the University Museum, Edinburgh, another bird, killed 

 in Scotland, and belonging to Mr Henderson of that city, had 

 served him for a description of the species. A third example is 

 referred to in the statistical account of the parish of Peterhead, 

 the writer of which states that a specimen of the Nutcracker, 

 killed near that town, was in the collection of Mr Arbuthnot 

 there in 1833.* 



These records, inexplicit as they appear to be, were all that had 

 been made regarding this bird north of the Tweed, until the oc- 

 currence of a specimen in Inverness-shire in October, 1868; it was 

 shot at Invergarry and sent to Inverness, where it was preserved 

 by Mr William M'Leay, Taxidermist, 80 Church Street. 



* I visited the Peterhead Museum, which contains Mr Arbuthnot's collection, 

 in May, 1869, but could find no trace of the specimen. 



