A WOODLAND COASTER. 



One of the quaintest little birds of the woods is 

 the brown creeper. He is as full of wliims as a 

 fickle schoolgirl, so that it is always difficult to 

 predict what he will do next. I have called him a 

 coaster, for he spends most of his time sliding on 

 the trunks of trees and saplings, the difference be- 

 tween him and human coasters being that he always 

 goes up-hill instead of down. Even the wood- 

 peckers and nuthatches sometimes perch on a limb 

 or twig, but it would be heterodox for a brown 

 creeper to do so. With him it is creep, creep, creep 

 all da}^ long. 



You may know him by his white or whitish vest 

 and his brown coat, barred with dusky, white and 

 tawny. His body is rather flat, as is the case with 

 all birds that creep. He seems to be very warmly 

 clad in his modest suit of brown; and he needs 

 thick clothing, for he winters in this latitude, and 

 early in the spring hies away to the far North. 



It is a rare pleasure to watch him creeping by 

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