BROWN CREEPER. 133 
loose attachment of its lower edges, allows a sufficiently free circulation of air to insure 
good ventilation. And as for concealment, excepting of course the positions chosen by 
some of the ground-building species, who must necessarily sacrifice nearly every other 
consideration of safety in favor of this one, it would be difficult to imagine a more 
perfectly hidden nest. The very simplicity and naturalness of the situation is well cal- 
culated to deceive all enemies, and the imperfections of our past records well attest how 
closely the secret has been kept from man, nor is it probable that the predatory birds 
or mammals are often more successful. Even should a Jay or squirrel succeed in dis- 
covering the presence of such a nest, they would be unable to enter through the narrow 
crevice used by the Creeper, and it is not likely that either their patience or strength 
would endure to tear out the sticks and other materials of the sub-structure from 
below, and thus obtain possession of the coveted eggs or young. Yet, now that the 
secret is out, the very peculiarity of its position renders this nest a singularly easy one 
to find. After taking my first specimen I experienced little difficulty in recognizing a 
‘Creeper tree’—as my guide got to, calling them—almost at a glance. 
“The Creeper is a frequent but scarcely a persistent singer, and his voice, though 
one of the sweetest that ever rises in the depths of the northern forests, is never a very 
conspicuous sound in the woodlands where he makes his home. This is due to the fact 
that his song is short and hy no means powerful, but its tones are so exquisitely pure 
and tender that I have never heard it without a desire to linger in the vicinity until it 
had been many times repeated. It consists of a bar of four notes, the first of moderate 
pitch, the second lower and less emphatic, the third rising again, and the last abruptly 
falling, but dying away in an indescribably plaintive cadence, like the soft sigh of the 
wind among pine boughs. I can compare it to no other bird voice that I have ever 
heard. In the pitch and succession of the notes it somewhat resembles the song of the 
Carolina Titmouse, but the tone is infinitely purer and sweeter. Like the wonderful 
melody of the Winter Wren, it is in perfect keeping with the mysterious gloom of the 
woods; a wild, clear voice that one feels would lose its greatest.charm if exposed to 
cheerful light and common-place surroundings.—On sunny April mornings I have heard 
the Creeper singing from the elms along the noisy streets of Massachusetts towns and 
cities; but the strain at such times was broken and incomplete, and gave but little idea 
of the author’s real power of song.” 
The eggs, four to six in number, are nearly oval in shape, and of a creamy-white 
ground-color, speckled and spotted, chiefly on or around the larger end, with reddish- 
brown. ’ 
NAMES: Brown CREEPER, American Creeper.—Baumlauter (German).—Grimpereau commun (Le Moine). 
SCIENTIFIC NAMES: Certhia familiaris Lath. (1758). Certhia americana Bonap. (1838). Certhia familiaris 
rufa Ridgw. (1873). CERTHIA FAMILIARIS AMERICANA Rwew. (1873). 
DESCRIPTION: Above, including sides of head and neck, dark brown, with rusty shade, especially on the 
rump, everywhere streaked with whitish. Beneath, dull white, under tail-coverts with a faint rusty 
tinge. A white streak over the eye; wings with two whitish cross-bars. Sexes alike. 
Length, 5.50 inches; wings, 2.50; tail ranging from 2.50 to 2.90 inches. 
A variety, the MExican CREEPER, Certhia familiaris mexicana B. B. & R., occurs 
from southern Arizona and Mexico to Guatemala. 
