156 WINTER NEIGHBORS. 



drummed up a mate ; his urgent and oft-repeated 

 advertisement was answered. Still the drumming 

 did not cease, but was quite as fervent as before. If 

 a mate could be won by drumming she could be kept 

 and entertained by more drumming ; courtship should 

 not end with marriage. If the bird felt musical be- 

 fore, of course he felt much more so now. Besides 

 that, the gentle deities needed propitiating in behalf 

 of the nest and young as well as in behalf of the 

 mate. After a time a second female came, when 

 there was war between the two. I did not see them 

 come to blows, but I saw one female pursuing the 

 other about the place, and giving her no rest for 

 several days. She was evidently trying to run her 

 out of the neighborhood. Now and then, she, too, 

 would drum briefly, as if sending a triumphant mes- 

 sage to her mate. 



The woodpeckers do not each have a particular dry 

 limb to which they resort at all times to drum, like 

 the one I have described. The woods are full of 

 suitable branches, and they drum more or less here 

 and there as they are in quest of food ; yet I am con- 

 vinced each one has its favorite spot, like the grouse, 

 to which it resorts especially in the morning. The 

 sugar-maker in the maple-woods may notice that this 

 sound proceeds from the same tree or trees about his 

 camp with great regularity. A woodpecker in my vi- 

 cinity has drummed for two seasons on a telegraph- 

 pole, and he makes the wires and glass insulators ring. 

 Another drums on a thin board on the end of a long 



