having many nests nearer our own level to
study, we never sought them, and noticed them only when the baby voices
attracted our attention. The home that apparently belonged to our bird
of the lawn was beautifully placed in a beech-tree heavy with foliage.
At first we thought the owner an eccentric personage, who had violated
all sapsucker traditions by building in a living tree; but, on looking
closely, it was evident that the top of the tree had been blown off,
and from that break the trunk was dead two or three feet down. In that
part was the opening, and the foliage that nearly hid it grew on the
large branches below. Most of the nests, however, were in the customary
dead trunks, on which we could gently rap, and bring out whoever was at
home to answer our call.

Young woodpeckers are somewhat precocious; or, to speak more correctly,
they stay in the nest till almost mature. We see in this family no
half-fledged youngster wandering aimlessly about, unable to fly or to
help itself, a sight very common among the feathered folk whose homes
are nearer the ground. One morning, a young bird, not yet familiar with
the mysteries of the world about him, flew into the open window of a
room in the house, and for an hour we had a fine opportunity to study
him near at hand. The moment he entered he went to the cornice, and
although he flew around freely, he did not descend so low as the top of
the window, wide open for his benefit. He was not in the least afraid or
embarrassed by his staring audience, nor did he beat himself against the
wall and the furniture, as would many birds in his position; in fact, he
showed unusual self-possession and self-reliance. He was exceedingly
curious about his surroundings: tapped the wall, tested the top of
picture frames, drummed on the curtain cornice, and closely examined
the ceiling. He was beautifully dressed in soft gray all mottled and
spotted and barred with white, but he had not as yet put on the red cap
of his fathers. While we watched him, he heard outside a sapsucker cry,
to which he listened eagerly; then he drummed quite vigorously on the
cornice, as if in reply. It was not till he must have been very hungry
that he blundered out of the window, as he had doubtless blundered in.

The beauty of the drumming family, at least in that part of the country,
is the red-headed woodpecker, which it happened I did not know. The
first time I saw one, he was out for an airing with his mate, on