LITTLE PRISONERS IN THE TOWER. 75 



screamed at me so imperatively that I hurried out 

 to the kitchen and rummaged through the cup- 

 boards till I found some food for them. They 

 opened their bills and gulped it down as if starv- 

 ing, although their guardian told me afterwards 

 that she had fed them two or three hours before. 



When held up where the air could blow on 

 them, they grew excited ; and one of them flew 

 down to the floor and hid away in a dark closet, 

 sitting there as contentedly as if it reminded him 

 of his tree trunk home. 



I took the two brothers out into the sitting- 

 room and kept them on my lap for some time, 

 watching their interesting ways. The weak one I 

 dubbed Jacob, which is the name the people of 

 the valley had given the woodpeckers from the 

 sound of their cries ; the stronger bird I called 

 Bairdi, as ' short ' for Melanerpes formicivorous 

 bairdi the name the ornithologists had given 

 them. 



Jacob and Bairdi each had ways of his own. 

 When offered a palm, Bairdi, who was quite like 

 ' folks,' was content to sit in it ; but Jacob hung 

 with his claws clasping a little finger as a true 

 woodpecker should ; he took the same pose when 

 he sat for his picture. Bairdi often perched in 

 my hand, with his bill pointing to the ceiling, 

 probably from his old habit of looking up at the 

 door of his nest. Sometimes when Bairdi sat in 

 my hand, Jacob would swing himself up from my 



