12 Mr. E. Gibson on the Ornithology of 
guns. The annexed breeding-notes witness to its confidence 
when nesting. 
Breeding-Notes.—The excavation for the nest is begun 
as early as September; but the eggs are only laid during the 
first half of October. The hole is generally commenced where 
some branch has decayed away; but care is taken that the 
remainder of the tree is sound. It opens at a height of 
from six to nine feet from the ground, and is excavated to 
a depth of nearly a foot. Occasionally it is sufficiently wide 
to admit of one’s hand; but such is not always the rule. 
No preparation is made for the eggs beyond the usual lining 
of some chips of wood. 
The pair which frequented the garden excavated a hole in 
a paraiso tree, and bred there for two consecutive years. 
The tree stood near one of the walks ; and on any one passing, 
the sitting bird immediately showed its head at the aperture, 
like a jack-in-the-box, and then flew away. Last year this 
pair actually bred in one of the posts of the horse-corral, 
notwithstanding the noise and bustle incident to such a 
locality. While waiting there, at sunrise, for the herd of 
horses to be shut in, I used often to knock at the post, in 
order to make the Woodpecker leave its nest; but the bird 
seemed indifferent to such a mild attack, and would even sit 
still while a hundred horses and mares rushed about the 
corral or hurled themselves against the sides of it. In another 
case I had worked with hammer and chisel for half an hour, 
cutting a hole on a level with the bottom of a nest, when the 
female first demonstrated her presence by flying out, almost 
into my face. This last nest contained four (considerably 
incubated) eggs, which I took. Happening to pass the spot 
a fortnight after, I inspected the hole, and was surprised to 
find that it had been deepened, and other five eggs laid, while 
the entrance I had cut was the one now used by the birds. 
The nest was again resorted to the following year, anda 
brood hatched out; but since then a pair of Wrens have oc- 
cupied the place, to the exclusion of the rightful owners. 
The glossy pear-shaped eggs (four or five to the nest) have 
an average measurement of 1%, or 14x $3. A dozen spe- 
