A RED-HEADED FAMILY. 19 



expense er the thing. Powder'n' lead air 

 mighty costive. Anyhow I don't s'pose 'at 

 the ole woodcock knowed at hit 'd drapped thet 

 air fraygment onto me. Ef hit 'd er 'peared 

 like's ef hit wer' 'joyin' the joke any, I wud er 

 shot hit all ter pieces ef I'd er hed ter lived 

 on turpentime all winter ! " 



Of the American woodpecker there are 

 more than thirty varieties, I believe, nearly 

 every one of which bears some trace of the 

 grand scarlet crown of the great ivory-billed 

 king of them all. The question arises and I 

 shall not attempt to answer it whether the 

 ivory-bill is an example of the highest develop- 

 ment, from the downy woodpecker, say, or 

 whether all these inferior species and varieties 

 are the result of degeneracy ? Neither Darwin 

 nor Wallace has given us the key that certainly 

 unlocks this very interesting mystery. 



The sap-drinking woodpeckers (Sphyropicus), 

 of which there are three or four varieties in 

 this country, appear to form the link between 

 the fruit-eating and the non-fruit-eating species 

 of the red-headed family. From sipping the 

 sap of the sugar-maple to testing the flavor of 

 a cherry, a service-berry, or a haw-apple, is a 

 short and delightfully natural step. How 

 logical, too, for a bird, when once it has ac- 

 quired the fruit-eating habit, to quit delv- 

 ing in the hard green wood for a nectar so 

 much inferior to that which may be had ready 

 bottled in the skins of apples, grapes, and ber- 

 ries ! In accordance with this rule, M. erythro- 

 cephalus and Centurus carolinus, though great 

 tipplers, are too lazy or too wise to bore the 

 maples, preferring to sit on the edge of a 

 sugar-trough, furtively drinking therefrom 



