180 YELLOW-BELLIED WOODPECKER. 



recumbent hairs, a narrow strip of white runs downward, curving round 

 the breast, mixing with the yellowish white on the lower part of the 

 breast ; throat the same deep scarlet as the crown, bordered with black, 

 proceeding from the lower mandible on each side, and spreading into a 

 broad rounding patch on the breast ; this black, in birds of the first 

 and second year, is dusky gray, the feathers being only crossed with 

 circular touches of black ; a line of white, and below it another of 

 black, i^roceed, the first from the upper part of the eye, the other from 

 the posterior half of the eye, and both lose themselves on the neck and 

 back ; back dusky yellow, sprinkled and elegantly waved with black ; 

 wings black, with a large oblong spot of white ; the primaries tipped 

 and spotted with white ; the three secondaries, next the body, are also 

 variegated with white ; rump white, bordered with black ; belly yellow ; 

 sides under the wings more dusky yellow, marked with long arrow-heads 

 of black ; legs and feet greenish blue ; tail black, consisting of ten 

 feathers, the two outward feathers, on each side tipped with white, the 

 next totally black, the fourth edged on its inner vane, half way down, 

 with white, the middle one white on its interior vane, and spotted with 

 black ; tongue flat, horny for half an inch at the tip, pointed, and armed 

 along its sides with reflected barbs ; the other extremities of the tongue 

 pass up behind the skull in a groove, and end near the right nostril ; in 

 birds of the first and second year, they reach only to the crown ; bill 

 an inch long, channelled, wedge-formed at the tip, and of a dusky horn 

 color. The female is marked nearly as the male, but wants the scarlet 

 on the throat, which is whitish ; she is also darker under the wings, and 

 on the sides of the breast. The young of the first season, of both 

 sexes, in October, have the crown sprinkled with black and deep scar- 

 let ; the scarlet on the throat may be also observed in the young males. 

 The principal food of these birds is insects ; and th'ey seem particularly 

 fond of frequenting orchards, boring the trunks of the apple-trees, in 

 their eager search after them. On opening them, the liver appears 

 very large, and of a dirty gamboge color ; the stomach strongly mus- 

 cular, and generally filled with fragments of beetles and gravel. In 

 the morning they are extremely active in the orchards, and rather shyer 

 than the rest of their associates. Their cry is also difi"erent, but though 

 it is easily distinguishable in the woods, cannot be described by words. 



