ZOOLOGY. 
213 
never seen this bird feed on anything but seeds and berries, and it rarely descends to the 
ground, never frequenting river banks or other places for dead fish and carrion, like crows. 
About the tops of the trees it may be seen extracting the seeds from cones; hanging head 
downwards like the chickadees. Its cry is loud and harsh like the crow's, and its flight rapid 
and steady, it having much larger wings than the jay. I have bad no opportunity of observing 
its nest, which is probably built in high trees; perhaps burrowed in decayed wood, as Avith the 
European species. — C. 
I have not myself obtained it on the Pacific side, but I was fortunate enough to get a 
specimen on Milk river, Nebraska, about 200 miles east of the Rocky mountains. The only 
bird of the kind I obtained I shot while it was flying past me, and as it was the only bird of 
the species I have seen I am unable to give any account of its habits. — S. 
Sub-Family GARRULINAE.— T h e Jays. 
PICA HUDSONICA, Bonap. 
MagXJic. 
CoTvus Pica, FoRSTEE, Phil. Trans. LXXII, 1772, 382.— Wilson, Am. Orn. IV, 1811, 75; pi. xxxv.— Bon. Obs. Wills. 
1825, No. 40.— Ib. Syn. 1828, 57.— Nuttall, Man. I, 1832, 219.— Aud. Orn. Biog. IV, 1838, 408; 
pi. 357. Not of Linnaeus. 
CorviK hudsonica, Jos. Sabine, App. Narr. Franklin's Journey, 1823, 25, 671. 
Fica hudsonica, Bonap. List, 1838. — -Ib. Conspectus, 1850, 383. — Maxim. Reise Nord. Amer. I, 1839, 508. — Ib. 
Cabanis' Journ. 1856, 197.— Newberry, Zool. Cal. & Or. Koute, Eep. P. R. K., VI, iv, 1857, 84.— 
Baird, Gen. Eep. Birds, 576. 
Clfptes liudsonicm, Gambel, J. A. N. Sc. 2d Ser. I, Dec. 1847, 47. 
Pica melanoleuca, " Vieill." Aud. Syn. 1839, 157.— Ib. Birds Amer. IV, 1842, 99; pi. 227. 
Sp. Ch. — Bill and naked skin behind the eye, black. General color, black. The belly, scapulars, and inner webs of the 
primaries, white; hind part of back grayish; exposed portion of the tail feathers glossy gi-een, tinged with purple and violet 
near the end; wings glossed with green; the secondaries and teitials with blue; throat feathers spotted with white. Length, 
19.00; wing, 8. 50; tail, 11. 00. 
Bab. — The Arctic regions of North America. The United States from the High Central Plains to the Pacific, north of 
California. 
This magpie is abundant throughout the central region of Oregon and Washington Territo- 
ries. On our journey across from the Mississippi I first saw this bird about 100 miles west of 
Fort Union, the American Pur Company's trading post, at the mouth of the Yellowstone, 
although one of our hunters told me that he saw one several weeks before in the middle of 
Minnesota. As we approached the Rocky mountains they became more and more plentiful, 
until in the mountains themselves, along the borders of streams, they were continually met 
with. They are almost as abundant as far west as the Cascade mountains. The dense mass 
of forest here met with affords a pretty effectual barrier to their passage. On Puget Sound, 
west of these mountains, I did not observe a single bird of this species until August, 1856, 
after which time, during the fall, they became moderately abundant. They appeared to have 
crossed over from the east side of the mountains by^some of the passes north of Mount Rainier, 
after the breeding season had ceased in the central section. I obtained two more specimens 
from Bellingham bay, near the 49th parallel north. An Indian from the northwest coast told 
me that the species is common at Sitka. 
This bird is mischievous and gluttonous, but not so tame or so fond of the society of man as the 
