Red-headed Woodpecker 
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on forehead, crown, chin and throat. He is 
smaller than a robin by two inches, yet larger 
than the English sparrow, who shares with him 
a vast amount of public condemnation. 
RED-HEADED WOODPECKER 
A pair of red-headed woodpeckers I know, who 
made their home in an old tree next the station 
yard at Atlanta, where locomotives clanged, 
puffed, whistled and shrieked all day long, 
evidently enjoyed the noise, for the male liked 
nothing better than to add to it by tapping on 
one of the glass non-conductors around which 
a telegraph wire ran. When first I saw the 
handsome, tri-coloured fellow he was almost 
enveloped in a cloud of smoke escaping from 
a puffing locomotive on the track next the tele- 
graph pole, yet he tapped away unconcerned 
and as merrily as you would play a two-step on 
the piano. When the vapour blew away, his 
glossy bluish black and white feathers, laid on 
in big patches, were almost as conspicuous as 
his red head, throat and upper breast. His mate 
is red-headed, too. 
All the woodpeckers have musical tastes. A 
flicker comes to my verandah to tap a galvan- 
ised rain gutter, for no other reason than the 
excellent one that he enjoys the sound. Tin 
