BIRD&-NESTS. 107 



which stretched out almost horizontally from the 

 main stem. It appeared merely a deeper shadow 

 upon the dark and mottled surface of the bark with 

 which the branches were covered, and could not be de- 

 tected by the eye until one was within a few feet of it. 

 The young chirped vociferously as I approached the 

 nest, thinking it was the old one with food ; but the 

 clamor suddenly ceased as I put my hand on that part 

 of the trunk in which they were concealed, the unusual 

 jarring and rustling alarming them into silence. The 

 cavity, which was about fifteen inches deep, was gourd- 

 shaped, and was wrought out with great skill and regu- 

 larity. The walls were quite smooth and clean and 

 new. 



I shall never forget the circumstance of observing a 

 pair of yellow-bellied woodpeckers, — the most rare 

 and secluded, and, next to the red-headed, the most 

 beautiful species found in our woods, — breeding in an 

 old, truncated beech in the Beaverkill Mountains, an 

 offshoot of the Catskills. We had been travelling, 

 three of us, all day in search of a trout lake, which 

 lay far in among the mountains, had twice lost our 

 course in the trackless forest, and, weary and hungry, 

 had sat down to rest upon a decayed log. The chat- 

 tering of the young, and the passing to and fro of the 

 parent birds, soon arrested my attention. The entrance 

 to the nest was on the east side of the tree, about 

 twenty-five feet from the ground. At intervals of 

 scarcely a minute, the old birds, one after another, 



