Songs Without Words 



fled, sonorous, crepitating ivhir-r-r-r that serves as 

 advertisement, challenge, love song, and an outlet 

 to his inordinate vanity and vigorous animal spirits. 

 Every sportsman 

 knows that sound 

 of the drummer 

 without a drum. 



When the night- 

 hawk drops down- 

 ward from a great 

 height, his out- 

 stretched wings 

 and tail create an 

 Aeolian instrument 

 which gives forth 

 the jarring, boom- 

 ing, whirring noise 

 that is more weird 

 than musical. 



With the excep- 

 tion of the flicker 

 a law unto him- 

 self among his 

 clan our native 

 woodpeckers are 

 instrumental per- 

 formers only. The 

 rap-tap-tapping of 

 their bills against 

 the tree trunks is as cheerful music as any in the 

 spring woods. The sapsucker hammers his vigor- 

 ous, impetuous, staccato proposal with more sense of 

 musical values, perhaps, than the others; but all are 



129 



The flicker our only woodpecker vocalist 



