An Exaggerated Bird

The imperial woodpecker is an exagfferation of tlie ordinary red-lieaded woodpecker. It i.s nearly two feet long, its plumag-e black and white, with a gorgeous scarlet crest, its bil! white. It lives in Mexico and in the Sierra V i Iro mountains. These birds are always f undrapairs and are lestroyers of trees, as they devote their cntire energ-ies t.o onc tree íor as lonL as a íortnight, it so greatly that the tree dies. In Europe and Asia there is a (fray-beaded woodpecker. The largest Piropean woodpecker is Eeventi'cn Inohes lonif, black, with Bcarlet crest. lt is callt-d the great woodpecker. Tlie littlc brown woodpecker oí Ceylon is not tive inches long. The vvliitc-headed woodpecker is a -wise-looking little creature that lives in the pine woods of the l'acilic coast. There are some two hundred rnd fifty species of woodpeckers, and they inhabit iilmost every part of tb.a globe.