THE PILEATED WOODPECKER. 227 



Wherever it occurs it is a permanent resident, and, like its relative the 

 Ivory-billed Woodpecker, it remains pretty constantly in the place which it 

 has chosen after leaving its parents. It is at all times a shy bird, so that one 

 can seldom approach it, unless under cover of a tree, or when he happens 

 accidentally to surprise it while engaged in its daily avocations. When seen 

 in a large field newly brought into tillage, and yet covered with girdled 

 trees, it removes from one to another, cackling out its laughter-like notes, as 

 if it found delight in leading you a wild-goose chase in pursuit of it. When 

 followed it always alights on the tallest branches or trunks of trees, removes 

 to the side farthest off, from which it every moment peeps, as it watches 

 your progress in silence; and so well does it seem to know the distance at 

 which a shot can reach it, that it seldom permits so near an approach. Often 

 when you think the next step will take you near enough to fire with 

 certainty, the wary bird flies off before you can reach it. Even in the 

 wildest parts of Eastern Florida, where I have at times followed it, to assure 

 myself that the birds I saw were of the same species as that found in our 

 distant Atlantic States, its vigilance was not in the least abated. For miles 

 have I chased it from one cabbage-tree to another, without ever getting 

 within shooting distance, until at last I was forced to resort to stratagem, and 

 seeming to abandon the chase, took a circuitous route, concealed myself in 

 its course, and w T aited until it came up, when, it being now on the side of 

 the trees next to me, I had no difficulty in bringing it down. I shall never 

 forget, that, while in the Great Pine Forest of Pennsylvania, I spent several 

 days in the woods endeavouring to procure one, for the same purpose of 

 proving its identity with others elsewhere seen. 



Their natural wildness never leaves them, even although they may have 

 been reared from the nest. I will give you an instance of this, as related to 

 me by my generous friend the Reverend John Bachman of Charleston, who 

 also speaks of the cruelty of the species. "A pair of Pileated Woodpeckers 

 had a nest in an old elm tree, in a swamp, which they occupied that year; 

 the next spring early, two Blue-birds took possession of it, and there had 

 young. Before these were half grown, the Woodpeckers returned to the 

 place, and, despite of the cries and reiterated attacks of the Blue-birds, the 

 others took the young, not very gently, as you may imagine, and carried 

 them away to some distance. Next the nest itself was disposed of, the hole 

 cleaned and enlarged, and there they raised a brood. The nest, it is true, 

 was originally their own. The tree was large, but so situated, that, from the 

 branches of another I could reach the nest. The hole was about IS inches 

 deep, and I could touch the bottom with my hand. The eggs, which were 

 laid on fragments of chips, expressly left by the birds, were six, large, white 

 and translucent. Before the Woodpeckers began to sit, I robbed them of 



