272 



JAY. 



are long, and in the form of a crest, which it can raise and depress at 

 pleasure. The hind parts of the head, the sides, neck, breast, back, 

 and scapulars a lightish brown colour, inclining- to red ; the lesser wing- 

 coverts inclining- to bay : the greater coverts are elegantly barred with 

 a rich blue and black alternately, the rest black ; the greater quill fea- 

 thers dusky ; the exterior webs ash-colour, except the first. Six of 

 the secondary quills are black, white on the exterior webs near the 

 base, and tinged with blue ; the two next entirely black ; those nearest 

 the body bay, tipped with black ; rump, upper and under tail coverts 

 white ; the tail black ; and the legs brown. 



This bird is found in considerable numbers in most of the wooded 

 parts of this country, but they seldom congregate together. Its nest 

 is commonly built in high coppice wood or hedges, and sometimes 

 against the side of a scrubby tree. It is formed of sticks, lined with 

 fibrous roots, and the bird lays five or six eggs of a light brown colour, 

 not very unlike those of the partridge, but smaller, and obscurely 

 marked with a darker shade of brown. 



The Jay is a cunning, crafty bird ; is a great devourer of fruit and 

 grain, and seems particularly fond of cherries and peas ; will frequently 

 plunder the smaller birds' nests of their eggs and young, and sometimes 

 pounce upon the old birds, on which it preys, as well as on mice. 



Its common notes are various, but harsh ; it will, some time in the 

 spring utter a sort of song in a soft and pleasing manner, but so low as 

 not to be heard at any distance ; and at intervals introduce the bleating 

 of a lamb, mewing of a cat, the note of a kite or buzzard, hooting of an 

 owl, and even the neighing of a horse. These imitations are so exact, 

 even in a natural wild state, that we have frequently been deceived. 



* These birds, which I call basket-makers, do not always select flexible 

 materials which we should deem indispensable, but usually prefer brittle 

 dead sticks, at least for the out-works, which are in fact constructed at 

 the outset, much on the model of the platform builders. The Jay, for 

 example, selects for its nest the fork of a bush or tree in a solitary part of 

 a wood, precisely similar to the ring dove, {Columba Palumbus^) and 

 commences the structure so exactly like it, that it would not be easy to 

 tell the difference between a finished nest of the one, and a half-finished „ 

 nest of the other. But it would seem that the Jay, though a much 

 shrewder bird in many respects than the ring-dove, is not acquainted with 

 the secret of preventing its eggs from rolling off a flat nest, perhaps be- 

 cause its five or six eggs are more difficult to manage than the ring dove's 

 two. Upon the platform then, as a foundation, the Jay constructs a sort 

 of rude basket-work of roots thickly matted together, the hollow being 

 very shallow, just large enough to contain the eggs, and greatly smaller in 



