38 BY-WAYS AND BIRD-NOTES, 
from morning till night over the ripest June- 
apples and reddest cherries, their noise mak- 
ing a Bedlarn of the fairest country orchard. 
The woodpecker family is scattered widely 
in our country. In the West Canadian woods 
one meets, besides a number of the commoner 
species, Lewis’ woodpecker, a large, beautiful, 
and rare bird. The California species include 
the Nuttall, the Harris, the Cape St. Lucas, the 
white-headed, and several other varieties, all 
showing more or less kinship to the ivory-bill. 
Lewis’s woodpecker shows almost entirely 
black, its plumage giving forth a strong green-. 
ish or bluish lustre. The red on its head is 
softened down to a fine rose-carmine. It is 
a wild, wary bird, flying high, combining in 
its habits the traits of both ylotomus pileatus 
and Campephilus principals. 
In concluding this paper a general descrip- 
tion of the male ivory-bill may prove accept- 
able to those who may never be able to see 
even a stuffed specimen of a bird which, taken 
in every way, is, perhaps, the most interesting 
and beautiful in America. In size 21 inches 
long, and 33 in alar extent; bill, ivory white, 
beautifully fluted above, and two and a-half 
inches long; head-tuft, or crest, long and 
fine, of pure scarlet faced with black. Its 
body-color is glossy blue-black, but down its 
slender neck on each side, running from the 
crest to the back, a pure white stripe contrasts 
vividly with the scarlet and ebony. A mass 
of white runs across the back when the wings 
are closed, as in AZ, erythrocephalus, leaving the 
wing-tips and tail black. Its feet are ash- 
blue, its eyes amber-yellow. The female is 
like the male, save that she has a black crest 
