A RED-HEADED FAMILY. 39 
instead of the scarlet. I can think of nothing 
in Nature more striking than the flash of color 
this bird gives to the dreary swamp-landscape, 
as it careers from tree to tree, or sits upon 
some high skeleton cypress-branch and plies 
its resounding blows. ‘The species will prob- 
ably be extinct within a few years.* 
* Since writing the foregoing, I have made several ex- 
cursions in search of the ivory-bill. Early in January, 
1855, I killed a fine male specimen in a swamp near 
Bay St. Louis, Mississippi; but was prevented, by an 
accident, from preserving it or making a sketch of it. 
