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THE PILEATED WOODPECKER. 
large larvce, often two or three inches in length ; but it does not appeal 
probable that the bristly point is ever used to transfix an object, otherwise 
how should the object be again set free without tearing off the prickles, which 
are extremely delicate and not capable of being bent in evei’y direction ? 
The trachea, k k, is 5 inches 4 twelfths in length, considerably flattened, 
nearly of the uniform breadth of 3 twelfths throughout. The aperture of 
the glottis is 4 twelfths long, with a posterior flap of several series of papillae. 
The rings of the trachea are very strong, firmly ossified, 92 in number. At 
the upper part 3 are incomplete ; the last entire ring is very broad and 
bipartite, and there are 2 additional dimidiate rings. The bronchi are short, 
of 12 half rings. The lateral or contractor muscles, 1 1 , commence in front, 
at the base of the thyroid bone, diverge, presently become lateral, and thus 
proceed until 44 twelfths from the extremity, when they terminate partly 
in the sterno-tracheal, but also send down a very thin slip, which is inserted 
on the first dimidiate ring. 
The explanation of the mechanism by which the tongue is protruded as 
above given, differs materially from any of those to be found in English 
works at least, in some of which there is a very unnecessary prolixity as 
well as ambiguity. It does not appear that hitherto the real sheath in which 
the horns of the hyoid bone, with its muscle, move, has been observed, and 
the two very slender muscles which run from the sides of the thyroid bone 
to the furcula, are common to almost all birds, although they have been 
supposed to be peculiar to Woodpeckers. 
THE PILEATED WOODPECKER. 
PlCUS PILEATUS, Linn. 
PLATE CCLVII. — Male, Female, and Young Males. 
It would be difficult for me to say in what part of our extensive country I 
have not met with this hardy inhabitant of the forest. Even now, when 
several species of our birds are becoming rare, destroyed as they are, either 
to gratify the palate of the epicure, or to adorn the cabinet of the naturalist, 
the Pileated Woodpecker is every where to be found in the wild woods, 
although scarce and shy in the peopled districts. 
