FAMILY Picida. 
If there is already a hollow in the tree of small size it 
is enlarged to the required dimensions in a remarkably 
short space of time, but still the housewife seems ta 
entertain some doubt about matters in general, and 
wastes more time ‘‘ poking around”! Wilson seems to 
approve of this questionable vigilance and remarks ad 
follows: ‘‘ Before she begins to lay, the female passes in 
and out, examines every part, both of the exterior and 
interior, with great attention, as every prudent tenant: 
of a new house ought to do, and at length takes com- 
plete possession.” 
Such good carpenters as these deserve a better name, 
but it is ever the case that mankind sums up the charac- 
ter of the bird in a trivial manner and labels him flip- 
pantly ! Indeed sometimes we are not above cracking 
a joke on the label. It is in The Spenders, I believe, 
that the farmer tells of his economical experiment in 
feeding his setting hen on sawdust, and finishes with the 
statement that of the thirteen eggs hatched out, twelve 
produced chickens with wooden legs and the thirteenth 
a woodpecker! Alas for the carpenter-bird, he is not 
appreciated ; he carves his home in the heart of the 
apple-tree, smooths its sides with the skill of a cabinet- 
maker, taps at the door of every insect that lives in the 
vicinity with a summons as inexorable as that of the 
Great Destroyer, and drums a rolling tattoo on a resonant 
limb or a telegraph pole in a master fashion that would 
** beat the band.” 
There is the musicianly part of his character; he is a 
member of the drum corps who sounds a reveille for the 
mere love of it, or, to speak .tore exactly, ‘‘ all for the 
love of the lady.” We should make no mistake about 
this, he is signalling for his mate, and if we stand by 
long enough it is possible we may see her. This summer 
{ listened to a rousing, rattling tattoo on a telephone 
pole near my cottage that could have been heard fully a 
quarter of a mile away, and after its second repetition, I 
saw two Downies where a moment before there was but 
one; so she had arrived! What few notes the Downy 
has may be compared to the ring of a marble quarrier’s 
chisel—to borrow an apt simile by Mr. Chapman. He 
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