  The capillary instability of liquid crystalline (LC) jets is considered in
the framework of linear hydrodynamics of uniaxial nematic LC. The free boundary
conditions of the problem are formulated in terms of mean surface curvature
${\cal H}$ and Gaussian surface curvature ${\cal G}$. The static version of
capillary instability is shown to depend on the elasticity modulus $K$, surface
tension $\sigma_0$, and radius $r_0$ of the LC jet, as expressed by the
characteristic parameter $\varkappa=K/\sigma_0 r_0$. The problem of capillary
instability in LC jets is solved exactly and a dispersion relation, which
reflects the effect of elasticity, is derived. It is shown that increase of the
elasticity modulus results in a decrease of both the cut off wavenumber $k$ and
the disturbance growth rate $s$. This implies enhanced stability of LC jets,
compared to ordinary liquids. In the specific case, where the hydrodynamic and
orientational LC modes can be decoupled, the dispersion equation is given in
closed form.
