198 
CERTHIA FAMILIARIS. 
them from the tree in which they had their nest. The 
male of this pair had the bill of the same extraordinary 
size with several others 1 had examined before ; the 
plumage in every respect the same. Other males, 
indeed, were found at the same time, of the usual size. 
Whether this be only an accidental variety, or whether 
the male, when full grown, be naturally so much larger 
than the female, (as is the case with many birds,) and 
takes several years in arriving at his full size, I cannot 
positively determine, though I think the latter most 
probable. 
The brown creeper builds his nest in the hollow 
trunk or branch of a tree, where the tree has been 
shivered, or a limb broken off, or where squirrels or 
woodpeckers have wrought out an entrance, for nature 
has not provided him with the means of excavating one 
for himself. I have known the female begin to lay by 
the 17th of April. The eggs are usually seven, of a 
dull cinereous, marked with small dots of reddish 
yellow, and streaks of dark brown. The young come 
forth with great caution, creeping about long before 
they venture on wing. From the early season at which 
they begin to build, I have no doubts of their raising 
two broods during summer, as I have seen the old ones 
entering holes late in July. 
The length of this bird is five inches, and nearly 
seven from the extremity of one wing to that of the 
other ; the upper part of the head is of a deep brownish 
black ; the back brown, and both streaked with white, 
the plumage of the latter being of a loose texture, with 
its filaments not adhering ; the white is in the centre 
of every feather, and is skirted with brown ; lower 1 
part of the back, rump, and tail-coverts, rusty brown, 
the last minutely tipt with whitish ; the tail is as long 
as the body, of a light drab colour, with the inner 
webs dusky, and consists of twelve quills, each sloping 
off and tapering to a point in the manner of the wood- 
peckers, but proportionably weaker in the shafts ; in 
many specimens the tail was very slightly marked with 
transverse undulating waves of dusky, scarce observable,* 
