YOUNG RED-HEADED WOODPECKER. 
431 
ing the nostrils are very short, and not thick, rufous grey, tip- 
ped with black ; the whole head, neck, and upper parts of the 
breast, (which are red in the adult,) are blackish, each feather 
broadly edged with whitish, giving the throat the appearance 
of being whitish, streaked with blackish ; the auriculars are 
plain dusky black ; from the breast beneath all is dingy white, 
the feathers of the breast and lower tail- coverts having dusky 
shafts ; the back and scapulars are black, the feathers being 
margined with whitish grey ; the rump and upper tail-coverts 
pure white ; the wings are five inches and a half long ; the 
spurious feather very short, the first primary subequal to the 
fifth, the second to the fourth, the third being longest ; the 
smaller wing-coverts are uniform with the back; the larger 
are of a deeper black, and tipped with pure white ; the spuri- 
ous wing is wholly deep black ; the under wing-coverts are 
pure white, blackish along the margin of the wing ; the pri- 
maries are plain black, tipped and edged externally with whi- 
tish ; the secondaries are white, shafted with black, and with 
an acuminate, broad, subterminal band, which, running from 
one to the other, takes a zigzag appearance ; the tail is four 
inches long, and, like those of all the woodpeckers we have ex- 
amined, composed of twelve feathers, of which the outer on 
each side is extremely short and inconspicuous, and pure white, 
with a black shaft. All the others, which are very acute, 
longer, and more acuminate, and stiffer as they approach the 
centre, are black, and, except the two middle ones, slightly 
whitish each side of the shaft at tip, the outer being also of 
that colour on its outer margin. The feet are dark plumbeous, 
the tarsus being seven-eighths of an inch long, and feathered 
for a short space in front. 
The young of both sexes are, no less than the adult, per- 
fectly alike ; as they advance in age, the margins of the fea- 
thers disappear, and the black becomes deep and glossy, and 
all the colours much purer ; the scarlet of the head comes on 
very gradually, so that specimens are found with merely a red- 
dish tinge, and generally with a few dots bn the hind neck ; 
