The Big Snow 203 



it was the worst sort of bad luck to have a jay 

 fly over your head, or in and out of your stable. 

 Bad luck also haunted whoever cut down a tree 

 with a jay's nest in it, unless the cutter took 

 the precaution first to knock down the nest 

 by throwing stones, and, if possible, also to 

 kill or cripple the nest-builders. 



Joe thought there was something to be said 

 for the jays. All he had ever shot had their 

 crops full of slugs, weed seed, and insect eggs. 

 He knew the jays were not patterns of all the 

 feathered virtues, but they were good to look 

 at, flashing in and out like bits of winged sky. 

 So he had made a slatted cover for an empty 

 hogshead in the granary, and had meant to 

 keep the jays in it, not so much to save them 

 — they were as hardy as they were audacious, 

 as to see what they would do by way of pass- 

 ing their time of captivity. He had seen them 

 by half dozens skylarking and chasing each 

 other in the bare branches of an oak. They 

 were bold fellows, bolder even than the red- 

 birds, nipping and pecking lustily at whatever 

 tried to seize them. They fought almost 

 constantly with the woodpeckers after cold 

 weather set in. He thought that was be- 

 cause they found, and stole, the woodpeck- 

 , ers' hoarded acorns. Going through the 

 woods, he had grabbled acorns from under 

 the snow, thinking to fling them in the hogs- 



