272 
JAY. 
are loii^, 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 lig-htish 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, {Columha Palumhus^ 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 
