206 Brewster on the American Brown Creeper. 
tore off shreds of the decomposing bark, until her bill was filled, 
then,, swinging downward in the usual characteristic manner, she 
alighted against the stem of the nesting-tree just below the hole, and, 
glancing about for a moment to be sure that no danger was near, 
glided nimbly upward, and with wonderful quickness disappeared 
under the edge of the sheltering bark. A few moments would then 
elapse, when the silence was broken only by the rasping cheep , cheep 
of the wood-borers in the rotting stubs around, or the hissing of 
a brood of Woodpeckers from their hole in the top of a tall dead 
ash a few yards away ; then she would suddenly appear again, flying 
directly from the nest to renew' her search at the base of an adjoin- 
ing tree. On these trips she was invariably accompanied by the 
male, who usually preceded her up the trunk, and upon her return 
to the nest, clung to the bark near at hand. His song was almost 
incessant, though the day was dark and stormy, and most of the 
wood birds utterly silent. But save by his cheering notes he appar- 
ently rendered no assistance ; indeed, on more than one occasion I 
caught him in the act of surreptitiously swallowing a grub which he 
had drawn from its concealment while his patient partner’s back was 
turned. If not an unselfish husband, he is. however, at least an 
attentive one. After the cares of incubation have begun, he is gen- 
erally to be found in the immediate vicinity of the nesting-tree, 
extending his leisurely rambles through the surrounding woods, 
but rarely straying far away from the spot. He 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 by 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 in- 
describably 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 {Par us carolinensis ), 
but the tone is infinitely purer and sweeter. Like the wonderful 
melody of the Winter Wren, it is in perfect keeping with the myste- 
rious gloom of the woods ; a wild, clear voice that one feels would 
