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Range (Eastern North America breeds) (XXXXXVI)

Eastern North America; breeds from Minnesota and Maine northward, and southward in Alleghanies to North Carolina; winters from Canada to Gulf States.

Washington, common W. V., Sept. 25 to Apl. 25. Sing Sing, tolerably common W. V., Sept. 20 to May 7. Cambridge, common T. V., rather common W. V., Sept. 25 to May 1. Nest, of twigs, strips of bark, bits of dead wood, moss, etc., placed behind the loose bark of a tree. Eggs, five to eight, white, spotted and speckled with cinnamon- or rufous-brown and lavender, chiefly in a wreath at the larger end, 62 × 47 (Brewster, Bull. Nutt. Orn. Club, iv, 1879, p. 199). The facts in the case will doubtless show that the patient, plodding Brown Creeper is searching for the insects, eggs, and larvæ which are hidden in crevices in the bark; but after watching him for several minutes one becomes impressed with the thought that he has lost the NUTHATCHES AND TITS. only thing in the world he ever cared for, and that his one object in life is to find it. Ignoring you completely, with scarcely a pause, he winds his way in a preoccupied, near-sighted manner up a tree trunk. Having finally reached the top of his spiral staircase, one might suppose he would rest long enough to survey his surroundings, but like a bit of loosened bark he drops off to the base of the nearest tree and resumes his never-ending task.

He has no time to waste in words, but occasionally, without stopping in his rounds, he utters a few screeping, squeaky notes, which are about as likely to attract attention as he is himself. As for song, one would say it was quite out of the question; but Mr. Brewster,* in his biography of this bird, tells us that in its summer home, amid the northern spruces and firs, it has an exquisitely pure, tender song of four notes, "the first of moderate pitch, the second lower and less emphatic, the third rising again, and the last abruptly falling, but dying away in an indescribably plaintive cadence, like the soft sigh of the wind among the pine boughs."