rickly cage. This fowl is like a slender brown
hen in size.

In the redwoods you hear the tap, tap, of the "carpenter" woodpecker,
with his black coat and gay red cap. He drills holes in the bark of a
tree with his strong beak and then fits an acorn neatly into each safe
little storehouse. It is thought that worms and grubs fatten while
living in these acorns, so that the woodpecker always has a meal ready
in the winter when the ground is wet, or the squirrels have carried
off the acorns under the trees.

Humming-birds, or "hummers," as the boys call them, are plenty in city
and country and so fearless that they will take a bath in the spray
of the garden-hose, or dart their long bills in the fuchsias almost
within your reach. The bill shields a double tongue, which gets not
only honey, but small insects from the flower or off the leaves. The
humming-bird's tiny nest is a soft, round basket, not much bigger than
half a walnut-shell, and holding two eggs, which are like small-white
beans. Bits of moss and gray cobwebs are woven in this nest till it
looks like the branch itself; and here the little mother in her plain
brown dress hatches out and feeds the baby "hummers." Her husband has
glistening ruby feathers at his throat and green spots on his head and
back that glow in the sun like jewels.

The highest class of birds is the "perchers," and many friends of
yours belong to this. There are two families, however, of perchers,
those that call and the song-birds. Calling over and over their
peculiar note, the pewees, flycatchers, and king-birds, fly through
the forests. The crow and blue jay belong to the singers, you will
be surprised to hear. And what a crowd of these song-birds there
are trilling and warbling in the sunshine! Have you ever watched the
meadow-lark singing as he sits on guard on the fence, while the rest
of his brown-coated yellow-vested flock run along the field picking up
seeds and insects?

Then there are the linnets, or "redheads," who sing their sweet,
merry tunes all summer, and if they do take a cherry or two the farmer
should not grumble. They destroy many bugs and caterpillars and eat
weed-seeds that might trouble the fruit-grower more than the missing
cherries. The yellow warbler, sometimes called the wild canary, flits
through bush and tree and trills its gay notes in town and country.
Song-sparrows, thrushes, and bluebirds warble far and near, while the
red-winged blackbird makes music in