THE BEAUTY OF THE FAMILY. 211 



curtain cornice, and closel}^ examined the ceil- 

 ing. He was beautifully dressed in soft gray all 

 mottled and spotted and barred with white, but 

 he had not as yet put on the red cap of his fa- 

 thers. While we watched him, he heard outside 

 a sapsucker cry, to which he listened eagerly; 

 then he drummed quite vigorously on the coi- 

 nice, as if in reply. It was not till he must 

 have been very hungry that he blundered out of 

 the window, as he had doubtless blundered in. 



The beauty of the drumming family, at least 

 in that part of the country, is the red-headed 

 woodpecker, which it happened I did not know. 

 The first time I saw one, he was out for an air- 

 ing with his mate, one lovely evening in June. 

 The pair were scrambling about, as if in play, 

 on the trunk of a tall maple -tree across the lane. 

 They did not welcome our visit, nor our perhaps 

 rather rude way of gazing at them; for one flew 

 away, and the other parched on the topmost 

 dead branch of a tree a little farther off, and 

 proceeded to express his mind by a scolding 

 '*kr-r-r," accompanied by violent bows toward 

 us. Finding his demonstration unavailing, he 

 soon followed his mate, and weeks passed before 

 we saw him again, although we often walked 

 down the lane with the hope of doing so. 



One beautiful morning, after the hay had 

 been cut from the meadow, and all the hidden 



