14 THE WOODPECKERS 



barbed heavily on both sides, and it is extensile. 

 As a tool it is the Solomon Islander's spear. A 

 medium-sized woodpecker can dart his tongue 

 out two inches or more beyond the tip of his 

 bill. A New Bedford boy might tell us, and 

 very correctly, that the woodpecker harj^oons 

 his grub, just as a whaleman harpoons a whale. 

 If the grub tries to back off into his burrow, 

 out darts the long, barbed tongue and spears 

 him. Then it drags him along the crooked 

 tunnel and into the narrow shaft picked by the 

 woodpecker, where the strong jaws seize and 

 hold him firmly. 



