THE WOODPECKER'S TOOLS: HIS BILL 71 



light and quick to be likened to the ponderous 

 swing of the pick-axe. Now he is drilling. The 

 work of a drill is to cut out a small deep hole 

 either by twirling (as in drilling metals) or by 

 tapping (as in drilling stone). The woodpecker 

 drills by the latter method and there is a curious 

 likeness between his bill and the mason's tools. 



Any one who has lived in a granite country 

 knows the deep round holes that stone masons 

 make when they split rock. Did you ever won- 

 der why they are as large at the bottom as at 

 the top ? If you remember the shape of a ma- 

 son's drill, you will recollect that it looks a little 

 like a stick of home-made molasses candy bitten 

 off when it was just soft enough to stretch a 

 little. The mason's drill is a round iron rod 

 with a thin, flat end, sharpened on the edge and 

 a little pointed in the centre. In the flattening 

 of the sides and the width across the tip its 

 end resembles that of a typical woodpecker's 

 bill. The woodpeckers that drill for grubs, es- 

 pecially the largest, the logcock and the ivory- 

 billed woodpecker, have the tip remarkably flat- 

 tened. The likeness to the drill does not go 

 farther because the woodpecker's bill is a combi- 

 nation tool; but it is drill-pointed rather than 

 pick-pointed. 



What is the advantage of this compressed 



