Sometimes only
one came, and after a short performance disappeared. Perhaps they
thought me harmless, or that they had deceived me so well at first
that I did not even suspect them of nest-building. Anyway, I never
pretended I knew.
As the afternoon wore away, and the sun dropped into the pine tops,
the chickadees grew hungry, and left their work until the morrow. They
were calling among the young birch buds as I left them, busy and
sociable together, hunting their supper.
XI. A FELLOW OF EXPEDIENTS.
[Illustration]
Among the birds there is one whose personal appearance is rapidly
changing. He illustrates in his present life a process well known
historically to all naturalists, viz., the modification of form
resulting from changed environment. I refer to the golden-winged
woodpecker, perhaps the most beautifully marked bird of the North,
whose names are as varied as his habits and accomplishments.
Nature intended him to get his living, as do the other woodpeckers, by
boring into old trees and stumps for the insects that live on the
decaying wood. For this purpose she gave him the straight, sharp,
wedge-shaped bill, just calculated for cutting out chips; the very
long horn-tipped tongue for thrusting into the holes he makes; the
peculiar arrangement of toes, two forward and two back; and the stiff,
spiny tail-feathers for supporting himself against the side of a tree
as he works.
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