258 Certhiada. 



name from the food it loves ; in the former it is known as 

 Hormiguero, in the latter as Papa-formigas, both signifying 

 ' ant-eater.' In Spain, however, it has a second name, Torcecuello 

 'Wryneck.' It is of shy retiring habits, in shape very like a 

 woodpecker, with the same arrangement of feet, two toes before 

 and two behind, but without the stiff bristly tail. Its plumage 

 is beautifully pencilled, all the feathers most delicately mottled 

 and marbled with bars and spots of dark and light brown, gray 

 and buff. 



Mr. Harting describes its loud oft-repeated note as like a 

 repetition of the syllables, ' Oh, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear,' 

 and says it more nearly resembles the cry of the kestrel than that 

 of any other bird, though it is less harsh* It is a solitary un- 

 sociable bird, seldom seen, except in the breeding season, in 

 company with another. The only time I ever found it in any 

 number, was in a marshy coppice near Bordighera, in North 

 Italy, from which I brought home some specimens; but the 

 locality it selected was not a pleasant one, a hot, steaming, 

 pestilential swamp which, whenever I visited it, was always 

 swarming with adders. My personal acquaintance with it in 

 Wiltshire has been very slight ; twice only have I seen it in my 

 orchard at Yatesbury ; but I have records of it as an occasional 

 visitor in various parts of the county, and Mr. Grant has 

 received it from Devizes, Everley, Pewsey, Netheravon, Poulshot, 

 etc. The Rev. A. P. Morres had one brought in alive to the 

 Vicarage at Britford, by his cat last summer (1886), and Mr. 

 Gwatkin tells me it was heard several times at Worton in 1880. 



(THE CREEPERS). 



This family is very nearly allied to the last, and the members 

 of it are quite as great adepts in climbing, though with a 

 different formation of feet, the toes being disposed in the more 

 usual manner, viz., three before and one behind ; the structure 

 of the hind-toe, however, is such as to give the bird peculiar 



* Birds of Middlesex,' p. 113. < Our Summer Migrants,' p. 246. 



