100 YELLOW-BELLIED WOODPECKER. 
at the triumphant moment when he thinks the nestlings his own, and 
strips his arm, launching it down into the cavity, and grasping what he 
conceives to be the callow young, starts with horror at the sight ofa 
hideous snake, and almost drops from his giddy pinnacle, retreating 
down the tree with terror and precipitation. Several adventures of 
this kind have come to my knowledge; and one of them was attended 
with serious consequences, wnere both snake and boy fell to the 
ground ; and a broken thigh, and long confinement, cured the adven- 
turer completely of his ambition for robbing Woodpeckers’ nests. 
YELLOW-BELLIED WOODPECKER.—PICUS VARIUS. — 
Fre. 36. 
Picus varius, Linn. Syst. i. 176, 20.— Gmel. Syst. i. 735.—Le pic varié de la 
Caroline, Buff. vii. 77. Pl. enl. 785.— Yellow-bellied Woodpecker, Catesb. i. 21. 
— Arct. Zool. ii. No. 166.— Lath. Syn. ii. 574, 20. Id. Sup. p. 109. — Peale’s 
Museum, No. 2004. 
DENDROCOPUS VARIUS. —Swainson.* 
Picus varius, Bonap. Synop. p. 45.— Wagl. Syst. Av. Picus, No. 16.—Dendro- 
copus varius, North. Zool. ii. p. 309. 
Tuis beautiful species is one of our resident birds. It visits our 
orchards in the month of October in great numbers, is occasionally 
seen during the whole winter and spring, but seems to seek the depths 
of the forest, to rear its young in; for, during summer, it is rarely seen 
among our settlements; and even in the intermediate woods, I have 
seldom met with it in that season. According to Brisson, it inhabits 
the continent from Cayenne to Virginia; andI may add, as far as to 
Hudson’s Bay, where, according to Hutchins, they are called Meksewe 
* In this species, and the two following, the little Woodpecker of this country, 
and many others, we have the types of a sub-genus (Dendrocopus, Koch) among 
the Woodpeckers, which I have no hesitation in adopting, as containing a very 
marked group of black and white spotted birds, allied to confusion with each other. 
The genus is made use of, for the first time, in a British publication, the Northern 
Zoology, by Mr. Swainson, as the third sub-genus of Picus. He thus remarks :— 
“The third sub-genus comprehends all the smaller black and white spotted 
Woodpeckers of Europe and America. Some few occur in the mountainous parts 
of India; but, with these exceptions, the group, which is very extensive, seems to 
uelong more particularly to temperate latitudes.” 
“It was met with by the over-land expedition in flocks, on the banks of the Sas- 
katchewon, in May. Its manners, at that period of the year, were strikingly con- 
trasted with those of the resident Woodpeckers ; for, instead of flitting in a solitary 
way, from tree to tree, and assiduously boring for insects, it flew about in crowded 
flocks, in a restless manner, and kept up a continual chattering. Its geographical 
range is extensive, from the sixty-first patallel of :atitude, to Mexico.” 
r. Swainson mentions having received a single specimen of a Woodpecker from 
Georgia, closely allied to this, which he suspects to be undescribed; and, in the 
event of being correct, he proposes to dedicate it to Mr. Audubon, — Dendrocopus 
Audubonii, Sw. — Ep. 
