Page:EB1911 - Volume 15.djvu/123

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JACKAL—JACKSON, ANDREW
107

and graces, has a disputed and curious history. According to the New English Dictionary it first appears in 1450 in reference to William de la Pole, duke of Suffolk (Political Poems, “Rolls Series,” II. 224), “Jack Napys with his clogge hath tiede Talbot oure gentille dogge.” Suffolk’s badge was a clog and chain, such as was often used for an ape kept in captivity, and he is alluded to (ibid. 222) as “Ape clogge.” Jack Napes, Jack o’ Napes, Jackanapes, was a common name for a tame ape from the 16th century, and it seems more likely that the word is a fanciful name for a monkey than that it is due to the nickname of Suffolk.


JACKAL (Turk, chakāl), a name properly restricted to Canis aureus, a wolf-like wild member of the dog family inhabiting eastern Europe and southern Asia, but extended to include a number of allied species. Jackals resemble wolves and dogs in their dentition, the round eye-pupils, the period of gestation, and to a large extent also in habits. The European species grows to a height of 15 in. at the shoulders, and to a length of about 2 ft., exclusive of its bushy tail. Typically the fur is greyish-yellow, darker on the back and lighter beneath. The range of the common jackal (C. aureus) extends from Dalmatia to India, the species being represented by several local races. In Senegal this species is replaced by C. anthus, while in Egypt occurs the much larger C. lupaster, commonly known as the Egyptian wolf. Nearly allied to the last is the so-called Indian wolf (C. pallipes). Other African species are the black-backed jackal (C. mesomelas), the variegated jackal (C. variegatus), and the dusky jackal (C. adustus). Jackals are nocturnal animals, concealing themselves until dusk in woody jungles and other natural lurking places, and then sallying forth in packs, which sometimes number two hundred individuals, and visiting farmyards, villages and towns in search of food. This consists for the most part of the smaller mammals and poultry; although the association in packs enables these marauders to hunt down antelopes and sheep. When unable to obtain living prey, they feed on carrion and refuse of all kinds, and are thus useful in removing putrescent matter from the streets. They are also fond of grapes and other fruits, and are thus the pests of the vineyard as well as the poultry-yard. The cry of the jackal is even more appalling than that of the hyena, a shriek from one member of a pack being the signal for a general chorus of screams, which is kept up during the greater part of the night. In India these animals are hunted with foxhounds or greyhounds, and from their cunning and pluck afford excellent sport. Jackals are readily tamed; and domesticated individuals are said, when called by their masters, to wag their tails, crouch and throw themselves on the ground, and otherwise behave in a dog-like fashion. The jackal, like the fox, has an offensive odour, due to the secretion of a gland at the base of the tail.

Egyptian Jackal (Canis lupaster).


JACKDAW, or simply Daw (Old Low German, Daha; Dutch, Kaauw), one of the smallest species of the genus Corvus (see Crow), and a very well known inhabitant of Europe, the C. monedula of ornithologists. In some of its habits it much resembles its congener the rook, with which it constantly associates during a great part of the year; but, while the rook only exceptionally places its nest elsewhere than on the boughs of trees and open to the sky, the daw almost invariably chooses holes, whether in rocks, hollow trees, rabbit-burrows or buildings. Nearly every church-tower and castle, ruined or not, is more or less numerously occupied by daws. Chimneys frequently give them the accommodation they desire, much to the annoyance of the householder, who finds the funnel choked by the quantity of sticks brought together by the birds, since their industry in collecting materials for their nests is as marvellous as it often is futile. In some cases the stack of loose sticks piled up by daws in a belfry or tower has been known to form a structure 10 or 12 ft. in height, and hence this species may be accounted one of the greatest nest-builders in the world. The style of architecture practised by the daw thus brings it more than the rook into contact with man, and its familiarity is increased by the boldness of its disposition which, though tempered by discreet cunning, is hardly surpassed among birds. Its small size, in comparison with most of its congeners, alone incapacitates it from inflicting the serious injuries of which some of them are often the authors, yet its pilferings are not to be denied, though on the whole its services to the agriculturist are great, for in the destruction of injurious insects it is hardly inferior to the rook, and it has the useful habit of ridding sheep, on whose backs it may be frequently seen perched, of some of their parasites.

The daw displays the glossy black plumage so characteristic of the true crows, varied only by the hoary grey of the ear-coverts, and of the nape and sides of the neck, which is the mark of the adult; but examples from the east of Europe and western Asia have these parts much lighter, passing into a silvery white, and hence have been deemed by some authorities to constitute a distinct species (C. collaris, Drumm.). Further to the eastward occurs the C. dauuricus of Pallas, which has not only the collar broader and of a pure white, but much of the lower parts of the body white also. Japan and northern China are inhabited also by a form resembling that of western Europe, but wanting the grey nape of the latter. This is the C. neglectus of Professor Schlegel, and is said by Dresser, on the authority of Swinhoe, to interbreed frequently with C. dauuricus. These are all the birds that seem entitled to be considered daws, though Dr Bowdler Sharpe (Cat. B. Brit. Museum, iii. 24) associates with them (under the little-deserved separate generic distinction Coloeus) the fish-crow of North America, which appears both in structure and in habits to be a true crow. (A. N.) 


JACKSON, ANDREW (1767–1845), seventh president of the United States, was born on the 15th of March 1767, at the Waxhaw or Warsaw settlement, in Union county, North Carolina, or in Lancaster county, South Carolina, whither his parents had immigrated from Carrickfergus, Ireland, in 1765. He played a slight part in the War of Independence, and was taken prisoner in 1781, his treatment resulting in a lifelong dislike of Great Britain. He studied law at Salisbury, North Carolina, was admitted to the bar there in 1787, and began to practise at McLeansville, Guilford county, North Carolina, where for a time he was a constable and deputy-sheriff. In 1788, having been appointed prosecuting attorney of the western district of North Carolina (now the state of Tennessee), he removed to Nashville, the seat of justice of the district. In 1791 he married Mrs Rachel Robards (née Donelson), having heard that her husband had obtained a divorce through the legislature of Virginia. The