BIRD COURTSHIP 51 



or two males will alight on a limb in front of the 

 female, and go through with a series of bowings 

 and scrapings that are truly comical. He spreads 

 his tail, he puffs out his breast, he throws back his 

 head, and then bends his body to the right and to 

 the left, uttering all the while a curious musical hic 

 cough. The female confronts him unmoved, but 

 whether her attitude is critical or defensive, I can 

 not tell. Presently she flies away, followed by her 

 suitor or suitors, and the little comedy is enacted on 

 another stump or tree. Among all the woodpeckers 

 the drum plays an important part in the match 

 making. The male takes up his stand on a dry, 

 resonant limb, or on the ridgeboard of a building, 

 and beats the loudest call he is capable of. The 

 downy woodpecker usually has a particular branch 

 to which he resorts for advertising his matrimonial 

 wants. A favorite drum of the high-holes about me 

 is a hollow wooden tube, a section of a pump, which 

 stands as a bird-box upon my summer-house. It is 

 a good instrument; its tone is sharp and clear. A 

 high-hole alights upon it, and sends forth a rattle 

 that can be heard a long way off. Then he lifts up 

 his head and utters that long April call, Wick, wick, 

 wick, wick. Then he drums again. If the female 

 does not find him, it is not because he does not make 

 noise enough. But his sounds are all welcome to 

 the ear. They are simple and primitive, and voice 

 well a certain sentiment of the April days. As I 



