BROWN CREEPER. 83 
of the usual size. Whether this be only an accidental variety, or 
whether the male, when full grown, be naturally so much larger than 
the female, (as is the case with many birds,) and takes several years 
in arriving at his full size, I cannot positively determine, though I 
think the latter most probable. 
The Brown Creeper builds. his nest in the hollow trunk or branch 
of a tree, where the tree has been shivered, or a limb ‘broken off, or 
where Squirrels or Woodpeckers have wrought out an entrance; for 
nature has not provided him with the means of excavating one for him- 
self. I have known the female begin to lay by the 17thof April. The 
eggs are usually seven, of a dull cinereous, marked with small dots of 
réddish yellow, and streaks of dark brown. The young come forth 
with great caution, creeping about long before they venture on wing. 
From the early season at which they begin to build, I have no doubts 
of their raising two broods during summer, as I have. seen the old 
ones entering holes late in July. 
The length of this bird is five inches, and nearly seven from the 
extremity of one wing to that of the other; the upper part of the head 
is of a deep brownish black; the back brown, and both streaked with 
white, the plumage of the latter being of a loose texture, with its fil- 
aments not adhering ; the white is in the centre of every feather, and 
is skirted with brown; lower ‘part of the back, rump, and tail-coverts, 
rusty brown, the last minutely tipped with whitish; the tail is as long 
as the body, of a light drab color, with the inner web dusky, and con- 
sists of twelve quills, each sloping off and tapering to a point in the 
manner of the Woodpeckers, but proportionably weaker in the shafts ; 
in many specimens the, tail was very slightly marked with transverse, 
undulating waves of dusky, scarce observable; the two middle 
feathers the longest, the others on each side shortening, by one sixth 
of an inch, to the outer one; the wing consists of nineteen feathers, 
the first an inch long, the fourth and fifth the longest, of a deep 
brownish black, and crossed about its middle with a curving band of 
rufous white, a quarter of an inch in breadth, marking ten of the 
quills; below this the quills are exteriorly edged, to within a little of 
their tips, with rufous white, and tipped with white; the three secon- 
daries next the body are dusky white on their inner webs, tipped on 
the exterior margin with white, and above that, alternately streaked 
laterally with black and dull white ; the greater and lesser wing-coverts 
are exteriorly tipped with white ; the upper part of the exterior edges 
of the former, rufous white; the line over the eye, and whole lower 
parts, are white, a little brownish towards the vent, but, on the chin 
and throat, pure, silky, and glistening; the white curves inwards 
about the middle of the neck; the bill is half an inch long, slender, 
compressed sidewise, bending downwards, tapering to a point, dusky 
above, and white below; the nostrils are oblong, half covered with a 
convex membrane, and without hairs or small feathers; the inside of 
the mouth is reddish; the tongue tapering gradually to a point, and 
horny towards the tip; the eye is dark hazel; the legs and feet, a 
dirty clay color; the toes, placed three before and one behind, the two 
outer ones connected with the middle one to the first joint; the claws 
rather paler, large, almost semicircular, and extremely sharp pointed: 
the hind claw the largest. 
