62 Bird Life Stories 



and interior, with great attention, as every prudent tenant of 

 a new house ought to do, and at length takes complete 

 possession. The eggs are generally six, pure white, and laid 

 on the smooth bottom of the cavity. The male occasionally 

 supplies the female with food while she is sitting. About the 

 last week in June the young are perceived making their way 

 up the tree, climbing with considerable dexterity. 



All this goes on with great regularity where no interruption 

 is met with, but the House-wren, which also builds in the hollow 

 of a tree, but which is furnished with neither the necessary tools 

 nor strength for excavating such an apartment for himself, 

 sometimes allows the Woodpeckers to go on until he thinks it 

 will answer his purpose. Then he attacks them with violence 

 and generally succeeds in driving them off. I saw some weeks 

 ago a striking example of this, where the Woodpeckers, after 

 commencing in a cherry-tree within a few yards of the house, 

 and having made considerable progress, were turned out by 

 the Wren. The Woodpeckers began again in a pear-tree, 

 fifteen or twenty yards off, where, after digging out a most 

 complete apartment, and one egg being laid, they were 

 once more assaulted by the same impertinent intruder and 

 finally forced to abandon the place. 



The principal characteristics of the Downy Woodpecker 

 are diligence, familiarity, perseverance, and a strength and 

 energy in the head and muscles of the neck that are truly 

 astonishing. Mounted on the infested branch of an old apple- 

 tree, where insects have lodged their corroding and destruc- 

 tive brood in the crevices between the bark and wood, he 

 labors until he has succeeded in reaching them. At these 

 times you may walk up pretty close to the tree, and even 

 stand immediately below it, within five or six feet of the bird, 

 without embarrassing him in the least. The strokes of his bill 



