The woodpecker taps.

As had happened with the nuthatch and the sparrow, I heard him before seeing him: first some notes, which by themselves would hardly have suggested a woodpecker origin, and then a noise of hammering.

The butterfly and humble-bee Come to the pleasant woods with me; Quickly before me runs the quail, The chickens skulk behind the rail, High up the lone wood-pigeon sits, And the woodpecker pecks and flits.

Then, perchance, while we gaze awe-stricken, along comes a merry squirrel, chattering and laughing, to break the spell, running up the trunk with no ceremony, and gnawing off the cones as if they were made only for him; while the carpenter-woodpecker hammers away at the bark, drilling holes in which to store his winter supply of acorns.

They were showy, noisy, and restless, and perched on twigs, in ordinary bird fashion, at least as often as they clung to the trunks in orthodox woodpecker style.

The other, a somewhat rarer bird, of the woodpecker tribe, was variegated with light blue and a grayish yellow.

If a woodpecker raps on the house, someone is going to die.