very downy feathers, they suffer little inconvenience from the inclemency of 

 the seasons. Their roost is in the hollows of decayed trees, where they also 

 breed, making a soft nest of moss, hair and feathers, and laying from six to 

 twelve eggs, which are white, with specks of brown-red. They begin to lay 

 about the middle or close of April, and though they commonly make use of 

 natural or deserted holes of the woodpecker, yet they frequently excavate a 

 cavity for themselves with much labor. The first brood takes wing about 

 the 7th or 10th of June, and there is sometimes a second brood toward the 

 end of July. The young, as soon as fledged, have all the external marks of 

 the adult, the head is equally black, and they chatter and skip about with all 

 the agility and self-possession of their parents, who appear nevertheless very 

 solicitous for their safety. 



From this time on the whole family continue to associate together 

 through the autumn and winter. They seem to move in concert from tree 

 to tree, keeping up a continued 'tshe-de-de-de-de and 'tshe-dc-de-de-dait, pre- 

 ceded by a shrill whistle, all the while busily engaged picking around the 

 buds and branches, hanging from their extremities and proceeding often in 

 reversed posture, head downward, like so many tumblers, prying into every 

 crevice of the bark and searching round the roots and in every possible retreat 

 of their insect prey or its larvae. If the object chance to fall, they industri- 

 ously descend to the ground and glean it up with the utmost economy. 



Almost the only note of this bird which may be called a song, is one 

 which is frequently heard at intervals in the depth of the forest, or from the 

 orchard trees. Although more frequently uttered in spring, it is now and 

 then whistled on warm days even in winter; it may be heard, in fact, in every 

 month of the year. It consists of two, or, less frequently, three clearly- 

 whistled and rather melancholy notes, like the syllables phee-bee, not drawled 

 like the song of the wood Pewee, and sweeter and more even than the cry of 

 the Phoebe. 



The Chickadee is found in summer in dry, shady and secluded woods, but 

 when the weather becomes cold, and as early as October, roving families, 

 pressed by necessity and failure of their ordinary insect fare, now begin to 

 frequent orchards and garden, appearing extremely familiar, hungry, indigent, 

 but industrious, prying with restless anxiety into every cranny of 

 the bark or holes in decayed trees after dormant insects, spiders and 

 larvae. The Chickadee adds by its presence, indomitable action antl chatter, 

 an air of cheerfulness to the silent and dreary winters of the coldest parts of 

 North America. 



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