on 
188 ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY. 
the moss and dead pieces of trees with their sharp, powerful 
bill. 
In traversing the limbs of trees, they resemble in their 
movements the Downy Woodpecker; and their flight is also 
similar to that bird’s. The note is a short, harsh call, simi- 
lar to the syllables cha-cha-cha-ché, uttered quickly, and with 
emphasis. 
SITTA CANADENSIS. — Linneus. 
The Red-bellied Nuthatch. 
Sitta Canadensis, Linneus. Syst. Nat., I. (1766) 177. Nutt. Man., I. (1882) 588. 
Aud. Orn. Biog., II. (1884) 24; V. 474. 
Sitta varia, Wilson. Am. Orn., I. (1808) 40. 
DESCRIPTION. 
Above ashy-blue; top of head black; a white line above and a black one through 
the eye; chin white; rest of under parts brownish-rusty. 
Length, about four and a half inches; wing, two and two-thirds inches. 
Hab. — North America to the Rocky Mountains, probably also to the Pacific. 
The same remarks as to distribution, habits, &c., will 
apply to this species as to the preceding. It is quite abun- 
dant as a summer resident in the wilds of Maine; and its 
notes are almost the first sound heard by the traveller on 
awakening in the early morning. I have sometimes heard 
its note in the night, while floating in my canoe on the 
bosom of some tranquil lake or between the banks of a 
sombre river; and frequently they seemed to be high up 
in the air, as if the bird had taken flight. These notes 
are a sort of drawling repetition of the syllable chape, like 
perhaps the following: Cheadpe, cheadpe, cheadpe. 
The nest is built in a hole in a tree or stump, usually 
excavated by the birds for the purpose: it is of the same 
description as that of the preceding, as are also the eggs 
with the exception of size; the present being considerably 
smaller, averaging .64 by .53 inch. 
Audubon, in describing the nest of the Red-bellied Nut- 
hatch, says, — 
