OUR WINTER BIRDS. 119 



moths and beetles as are abroad; but necessarily he must 

 subsist chiefly on the larvae which hibernate under the rot- 

 ten bark, and upon insects' eggs. Thus he is helped to 

 many a meal by the sapsuckers and tomtits, whose strong- 

 er bills tear open the recesses where the larvae lie. In 

 summer the kinglets retreat to boreal regions to rear their 

 young; but we know very little about their domestic life. 

 Just before they leave us in the spring I may, perhaps, 

 have the rare treat to hear a long way off the resonant song 

 of this minute minstrel bold and clear, carrying me away 

 aloft like that of the English skylark. 

 Another personification of 



" Contented wi' little, and canty wi' mair," 



is the brown creeper, whose bill is curved, and long, and 

 tender, so that he can do very little digging for himself,' 

 but follows in the track of the woodpeckers and nut- 

 hatches, and picks up the grubs which their vigorous beaks 

 have dislodged, or searches carefully for such small insects, 

 and their eggs, as are not well concealed. There is one 

 now in the tree next my window, in the edge of the city, 

 as I write. He flew from the neighboring horse-chestnut 

 to the foot of the ailantus, and began a spiral inarch up- 

 ward. I see him creep steadily round and round and 



