WHITE-BELLIED NUTHATCH 367 



of the bark ; and now it has found a savory morsel, 

 which it pauses to devour, then flits to a new bough. 

 It is a chubby bird, white, slate-color, and black. 



Jan. 6, 1859. As I go over the causeway, near the 

 railroad bridge, I hear a fine busy twitter, and, looking 

 up, see a nuthatch hopping along and about a swamp white 

 oak branch, inspecting every side of it, as readily hang- 

 ing head-downwards as standing upright, and then it 

 utters a distinct gnah^ as if to attract a companion. 

 Indeed, that other, finer twitter seemed designed to 

 keep some companion in tow, or else it was like a very 

 busy man talking to himself. The companion was a 

 single chickadee, which lisped six or eight feet off. 

 There were, perhaps, no other birds than these two 

 within a quarter of a mile. And when the nuthatch 

 flitted to another tree two rods off, the chickadee un- 

 failingly followed. 



March 5, 1859. Going down-town this forenoon, I 

 heard a white-bellied nuthatch on an elm within twenty 

 feet, uttering peculiar notes and more like a song than 

 I remember to have heard from it. There was a cliick- 

 adee close by, to which it may have been addressed. 

 It was something like to-ivhat what what what what^ 

 rapidly repeated, and not the usual gnah gnah ; and 

 this instant it occurs to me that this may be that earli- 

 est spring note which I hear, and have referred to a 

 woodpecker ! (This is before / have chanced to see a 

 bluebird, blackbird, or robin in Concord this year.) It 

 is the spring note of the nuthatch. It paused in its pro- 

 gress about the trunk or branch and uttered this lively 

 but peculiarly inarticulate song, an awkward attempt to 



