BLACK-AND-WHITE CREEPING- WARBLER. 
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compressed, and acute. Plumage very soft and blended. Bristles obsolete. 
Wings long, with the second and third quills longest and about equal, the 
first slightly shorter, and exceeding the fourth. Tail of moderate length, 
nearly eYen. This genus connects the Sylvicolinas with the Certhianae. 
BBACK-AND-WIIITE CREEPIN G-W ATtBLER. 
Mniotilta yaria, Linn. 
PLATE CXIV.— Wale. 
The Black-and-white Creeper appears in the State of Louisiana as soon as 
the buds on the trees begin to expand, which happens about the middle of 
February. It throws itself into the forests, where it breeds, and remains 
until the beginning of November. It is usually seen on the largest trees of 
our woods. It has a few notes, consisting of a series of rapidly enunciated 
tweets , the last greatly prolonged. It climbs and creeps along the trunks, 
the branches, and even the twigs of the trees, without intermission, and so 
seldom perches, that I do not remember ever having seen it in such a 
position. It lives principally on small ants and their larvae, which it secures 
as it ascends or descends in a spiral direction, sidewise, with the head either 
uppermost or beneath. It keeps its feet close together, and moves by 
successive short hops with a rapidity equalling even that of the Brown 
Creeper. It dives from the tops of the trees to their roots, and again ascends. 
At other times, it alights on a decayed fallen tree, and searches the bark for 
food, peeping into the crevices. It has only a very short flight, and moves 
directly from the tree it is on to the nearest. 
In this manner the Black-and-white Creeper reaches the Northern Dis- 
tricts. It always prefers the most uncultivated tracts, and is especially fond 
of the pines and hemlock-trees of the mountain-glens. I have met with 
it on the borders of Canada, round Lake Champlain, in the country far to 
the north-west, on the banks of the Illinois, in Ohio, Kentucky, and all the 
wooded districts of the Arkansas and Red river. 
In Louisiana, its nest is usually placed in some small hole in a tree, and is 
composed of mosses in a dry state, lined with cottony substances. The eggs 
