A YEAR WITH THE BIRDS 
561 
the little holes their chisel bills leave behind, but they are merely 
pulling out the insect hiding in the hollow. They can tell 
just where it is by tapping with the beak, as a man can tell by 
tapping a wall with his hammer the precise spot where a stud 
is and where the wall is hollow. 
About this time the Downy’s friend, the handsome Yellow- 
bellied Sapsucker may appear; but you will not care to have 
him stay long, for he does suck sap, and if he stays too long 
in one spot the trees will suffer. Then there is the Flicker, the 
big pigeon woodpecker, with his wings lined with dull gold, 
speckled back, with a white spot over the tail, and a red mark 
on the nape of neck. 
You will look and rub your eyes and look again. Is it a 
mouse running upward round and round the tree ? No, for it 
has feathers and a sharp, curved bill, and it is a little, brownish 
bird with a light breast, much smaller than an English Spar- 
row, and as it creeps about its dark eyes spy out hundreds of 
insects in the bark — the Brown Creeper. 
Quack, quack, and a short-tailed bird of chunky build, gray 
back, black head, and white breast comes running down the 
tree head foremost, and stops to look at you still in this same 
strange position. It is the White-breasted Nuthatch, and he 
will stay all winter if you will put suet on the lunch counter, 
as well as his little chum, the white-faced, black-capped 
Chickadee, who is looking down at him from above and calling 
his own name merrily at the same time, as if he did not wish to 
be mistaken for anyone else. 
Before it is time for folks to go a-hunting some morning 
you may see a flock of young Quail, or Bob-whites, cross the 
road, all running together like chickens, for they have never 
yet heard a gun and so they do not fear man. Bob himself is 
shy in autumn and silent except for the few sweet notes of his 
“ scatter call ” by which he signals to a scattered flock. 
This is the time that when a boy sees little round holes in 
the mud by the spring in the morning he knows that a Wood- 
cock has been feeding there the night before. 
October comes, and the leaves fall slowly if it is a late season, 
As the twigs of some trees grow bare you will, if you look 
carefully in evergreens or among apple boughs, see two little 
birds, one smaller than any other bird except a Winter Wren 
or a Humming-bird; it has a dull olive-green back, with a 
