The Birds' Calendar 



as one would do in regard to any of his other 

 friends. 



An inoffensive but wearisome httle fellow is 

 a brown-clad denizen of all our woods in win- 

 ter, and commonly found not far away from 

 the kinglets and chickadees, viz., the brown 

 creeper, almost invariably seen on the trunks 

 of trees whose bark is somewhat rough, as the 

 smooth surface of other trees affords no hiding- 

 place for the larvce on which he subsists. He 

 is a little over five inches long, white beneath, 

 and finely marked with various shades of brown 

 and w^hite above. On first acquaintance it 

 makes no particular impression other than that 

 of being a neatly clad and busy little body ; 

 but in course of time it becomes really irritat- 

 ing to the feelings, from its exasperatingly con- 

 scientious but cold-blooded diligence, which 

 makes you feel as if you ought to admire it on 

 moral grounds ; but you cannot. In fact, too 

 much conscience gets to be monotonous. The 

 brown creeper is a virtuous drudge, without 

 animation or variation. There is an air about 

 him, as he silently climbs tree after tree, that 

 makes his work seem as soulless as it is incessant. 

 When you have seen it a minute you have seen 

 it a year, and seeing one is seeing a thousand. 



28 



