DUSKY, GRAY, AND SLATE-COLORED 331 



forest, he is hailed as a welcome bit of life and fed until 

 he becomes very tame and very saucy. 



It is on the crests of the Sierra Nevada that these 

 birds are found most abundantly. Here they sun them- 

 selves on the highest peaks, frolicking noisily in the clear, 

 bracing air. When hungry or thirsty, out they dart from 

 their lofty perches and, with wings folded, hurl them- 

 selves down the canon with the speed of a bullet. Just 

 as you are sure they will be dashed to pieces, their wings 

 open with an explosive noise and the headlong fall is 

 checked in a moment. Sometimes the descent is finished 

 as lightly as the fall of a bit of thistle down ; sometimes 

 by another series of swift flights ; often by one rocket- 

 like plunge. At the foot a mountain brook furnishes 

 food and drink. As the shadows creep up the sides of 

 the canon, the Nutcrackers follow the receding sunlight 

 to the summit again, mounting by very short flights from 

 tree to tree, in the same way that a jay climbs to the top 

 of a tree by hopping from one bi-anch to another. 



My own records of the nesting habits of this bird as 

 studied in the San Bernardino mountains differ some- 

 what from those made by observers in more northern 

 regions. The nests were all rather bulky, composed first 

 of a platform of twigs, each one nearly a foot in length, 

 so interlaced that to pull one was to disarrange the mass. 

 Upon this, and held in place by the twigs at the sides, 

 was the nest proper, — a soft, warm hemisphere of fine 

 strips of bark, matted with grasses and pine needles 

 until it was almost like felt. This is stiffened, bound, 

 and made firmer by coarse strips of bark around the out- 



