STELLER'S JAY. 
405 
engraved, and published, on this side of the Atlantic. It is the 
frequent exercise of similar disinterestedness in the promotion 
of scientific objects, that has procured for Mr Leadbeater the 
distinction with which he is daily honoured by learned bodies 
and individuals. 
The Steller’s jay is one of those obsolete species alluded to 
in the preface to this volume. It is mentioned by Pallas as 
having been shot by Steller, when Behring’s crew landed upon 
the coast of America. It was first described by Latham, from a 
specimen in Sir Joseph Banks’s collection, from Nootka Sound, 
and on his authority has been admitted into all subsequent com- 
pilations. The species is indeed too well characterised to be 
doubted, and appears moreover to have been known to Tem- 
minck, as it is cited by him as a true jay in his Analysis of a 
General System, Nevertheless, adhering strictly to our plan 
of not admitting into the Ornithology of the United States, 
any but such as we had personally examined, we did not in- 
clude this species either in our Catalogue, or Synopsis, of the 
birds of this country; and it is but recently that Mr Lead- 
beater’s specimen has enabled us to add it to our list. 
In elevating our subgenus Garrulus to the rank of a genus, 
we merely conform to the dictates of nature ; in this instance 
coinciding with Temminck, whose intention it is, as he informs 
us, to include in it the jays and magpies, leaving the name of 
Corvus for those species which are distinguished by their black 
plumage, and short and even tails. These birds are on every 
account well worthy of this distinction, and we cheerfully 
adopt an arrangement which we deem consonant with nature : 
but we cannot agree to the change of termination (Garrula) 
which he has attempted to introduce, under the pretence that 
his genus is more extensive than the genus Garrulus of former 
authors. That genus was, in fact, formed by Brisson, and 
afterwards by Linne, united with Corvus, This latter genus 
of Linne certainly contained within itself the constituents of 
several very natural genera ; but the additions made to it by 
Gmelin and Latham rendered it an utter chaos, where every 
