144 THE BIRDS ABOUT Us. 



of time late autumn days when the leafless woods are 

 silent. There is the warm sunshine on the forest 

 floor, there is the lingering green of holly and cedar, 

 but the day is dead. Not even the brilliant scarlet 

 and golden berries of the bitter-sweet tempts any bird. 

 It is all the bitterness of loneliness, nothing of the 

 sweet of company. The beauty of the Indian sum- 

 mer has led you out into a deserted world, and every 

 thought is tinged with melancholy. You are ready 

 almost at the outset to return, when suddenly, afar 

 off, there is a rapid drumming. A low but resonant 

 note fills the woods. The life you hoped to see and 

 hear is returning. Listen ! The loud chirps of hid- 

 den sparrows are a response. The woodpecker again 

 and more violently beats his drum, and now a sleepy 

 cardinal awakes and sounds a few clear fife-like 

 notes in reply. When this has been your experience, 

 as it has so often been mine, you will learn to love 

 the music of even a woodpecker. 



The largest and most superb of all the tribe is the 

 rare Ivory-billed Woodpecker, that is now found only 

 in " restricted localities in the Gulf States (including 

 Florida) and lower Mississippi Valley." The prob- 

 abilities are that it will soon be extinct, so far as the 

 United States is concerned. It is too handsome not 

 to tempt every collector, taxidermist, and millinery 

 establishment in the country, and he who protests 

 will be laughed at for his trouble. 



In the Middle States and northward we have, all 

 the year round, two little woodpeckers known as the 

 " Hairy" and " Downy," and more usually in the 

 country they are called " Sapsuckers," from the prev- 



