54 
WHITE-BREASTED NUTHATCH. 
ing round, he again mounts, with fresh activity, piping his uni- 
sons as before. Strongly attached to his native forests, he sel- 
dom forsakes them ; and amidst the rigours of the severest win- 
ter weather, his note is still heard in the bleak and leafless woods, 
and among the howling branches. Sometimes the rain, freezing 
as it falls, encloses every twig, and even the trunk of the tree, 
in a hard transparent coat or shell of ice. On these occasions, I 
have observed his anxiety and dissatisfaction, at being with dif- 
ficulty able to make his way along the smooth surface ; at these 
times generally abandoning the trees, gleaning about the stables, 
around the house, mixing among the fowls, entering the barn, 
and examining the beams and rafters, and every place where he 
may pick up a subsistence. 
The name Nuthatch has been bestowed on this family of birds 
from their supposed practice of breaking nuts by repeated hatch- 
ings, or hammerings with their bills. Soft-shelled nuts, such as 
chestnuts, chinkopins, and hazel-nuts, they may probably be 
able to demolish, though I have never yet seen them so engaged; 
but it must be rather in search of maggots that sometimes breed 
there, than for the kernel. It is however said that they lay up 
a large store of nuts for winter; but as I have never either found 
any of their magazines, or seen them collecting them, I am in- 
clined to doubt the fact. From the great numbers I have opened 
at all seasons of the year, I have every reason to believe that 
ants, small seeds, insects and their larvae, form their chief sub- 
sistence, such matters alone being uniformly found in their sto- 
machs. Neither can I see what necessity they could have to 
circumambulate the trunks of trees, with such indefatigable and 
restless diligence, while bushels of nuts lay scattered round their 
roots. As to the circumstance mentioned by Dr. Plott, of the 
European Nuthatch “ putting its bill into a crack in the bough 
of a tree, and making such a violent sound, as if it was rending 
asunder,” this, if true, would be sufficient to distinguish it from 
the species we have been just describing, which possesses no 
such faculty. The female differs little from the male in colour, 
chiefly in the black being less deep on the head and wings. 
