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CHAPTER IV. 



CREEPERS HONEY-EATERS PIPITS AND WAGTAILS THE AMERICAN CREEPERS 



THE AMERICAN WARBLERS. 



THE CREEPERS Small Order Characteristics THE COMMON CREEPER Its Call note Macgillivray's Account of its 

 Habits Xest and E-gs -THE HONEY-EATERS Distinctive Features THE TRUE HONEY-EATERS THE WARTY- 

 FACED HONEY-EATER Mr. Gould's Description of the Species THE SUN-BIRDS Distribution Mr. Keulemans' 

 Account of their Habits Canon Tristram on the Jericho Sun-bird THE SECOND SUB-ORDER OF THE 

 PASSEKIFORMES THE FRINGILLIFORMES, OR FINCH-LIKE BIRDS Distinctive Features- 

 WAG TAILS AND PIPITS - Characteristics THE PIED WAGTAIL Essentially English Bird- Victimised by Cuckoos 

 Macgillivray's Account of the Wagtail's Habits Story of a Season Ticket THE AMERICAN CREEPERS 

 Difference between the Creepers of the Old and of the New World THE BANANA QUIT THE AMERICAN WARBLERS 

 Compared with their Old World Cousins THE SUMMER YELLOW BIRD Dr. Brewer's Account of its Habits. 



THE THIRD GROUP OF THE TURDIFORMES THE CERTHIIMORPHyE 



CREEPERS. 



THIS is an order of very small dimensions, the number of species contained within its limits not 

 exceeding fifty. They are all climbing birds, running about the trunks of trees very much after the 

 manner of Woodpeckers : they also resemble the latter in their stiffened tails. The resemblance to 

 a Woodpecker is of course only in the similarity of the creeping habits of the two birds, for there can 

 be no difficulty in recognising a Creeper from its foot, which has not the zygodactyle arrangement of a 

 Woodpecker, but has the toes placed three in front and one behind. 



In the Certhiimorphee the hind toe is very large, the other toes being very slender, long, strongly 

 compressed at the base, and joined to one another as far as the first joint, the claws extremely sharp, 

 strongly compressed, and the middle one not oblique. The bill is very slender and long, being curved 

 in the True Creepers, while it is stout and wedge-shaped in the Nuthatches, so much so that in the 

 last-named birds it becomes a powerful weapon for tapping at the trunks and branches of trees, and for 

 prising off the bark to get at the insects underneath. 



THE COMMON CREEPER (Certhiafamiliarit). 



The range of this little species is very considerable, as it is found not only over the whole of 

 Europe and Northern Asia, extending as far east as Japan, and southward to the Himalayas, but it 

 also inhabits the whole of North America as far as Mexico. In England it is tolerably plentiful 

 everywhere, and is often tj be seen in winter traversing the woods in company with Nuthatches, and 

 the different kinds of Titmice ; in the spring and summer it is usually seen in pairs, which keep up a 

 constant call-note, consisting of a single syllable, and generally rather ventriloquial in its nature, so 

 that it often seems to be uttered quite close to the observer when in reality the bird is at some little 

 distance. Once on a cold winter's morning in March, as the writer was engaged in collecting birds in a 

 park at Mongeron, in France, he was considerably startled by hearing close to him a loud and not 

 unmusical song, like that of a Titmouse, not a single bird of the latter family being apparently within 

 sight. After scanning the trees in all directions in search of the songster, who still continued to 

 pour forth his notes at short intervals, the musician was discovered to be none other than a 

 Creeper, who was clinging to the trunk of a tree about ten yards off, and continuing his song at 

 intervals after a short diversion in pursuit of insects. This struck the writer as curious, as he had 

 never heard a Creeper sing in England, nor has he found any one else who has ever done so ; but 

 Professor Newton states that during the breeding-season the male utters a song which is loud and 

 pleasing, though not often heard, and pitched in a high, shrill key. The Creeper from Southern 

 Europe has been supposed to be a distinct species from the true C. familiar is of Northern Europe, but 

 a comparison of specimens does not bear out this view, though the songless characteristic of the 

 British bird, as compared with the loud song which is possessed by the Continental Creeper, 

 woiild seem to favour the idea of their being different. In the Riviera, M. Basil Brooke states that 

 the males also sing lustily. 



