give him a chance to ask
any. From the edge of the Green forest there came a clear, loud call of,
"Pe-ok! Pe-ok! Pe-ok!"

"Excuse me, Peter, there's Mrs. Yellow Wing calling me," exclaimed
Yellow Wing, and away he went. Peter noticed that as he flew he went up
and down. It seemed very much as if he bounded through the air just as
Peter bounds over the ground. "I would know him by the way he flies just
as far as I could see him," thought Peter, as he started for home in the
dear Old Briar-patch. "Somehow he doesn't seem like a Woodpecker because
he is on the ground so much. I must ask Jenny Wren about him."

It was two or three days before Peter had a chance for a bit of gossip
with Jenny Wren. When he did the first thing he asked was if Yellow Wing
is a true Woodpecker.

"Certainly he is," replied Jenny Wren. "Of course he is. Why under the
sun should you think he isn't?"

"Because it seems to me he is on the ground more than he's in the
trees," retorted Peter. "I don't know any other Woodpeckers who come
down on the ground at all."

"Tut, tut, tut, tut!" scolded Jenny. "Think a minute, Peter! Think a
minute! Haven't you ever seen Redhead on the ground?"

Peter blinked his eyes. "Ye-e-s," he said slowly. "Come to think of it,
I have. I've seen him picking up beechnuts in the fall. The Woodpeckers
are a funny family. I don't understand them."

Just then a long, rolling rat-a-tat-tat rang out just over their heads.
"There's another one of them," chuckled Jenny. "That's Downy, the
smallest of the whole family. He certainly makes an awful racket for
such a little fellow. He is a splendid drummer and he's just as good a
carpenter. He made the very house I am occupying now."

Peter was sitting with his head tipped back trying to see Downy. At
first he couldn't make him out. Then he caught a little movement on top
of a dead limb. It was Downy's head flying back and forth as he beat
his long roll. He was dressed all in black and white. On the back of his
head was a little scarlet patch. He was making a tremendous racket for
such a little chap, only a little bigger than one of the Sparrow family.

"Is he making a hole for a nest up there?" asked Peter eagerly.

"Gracious, Peter, what a question! What a perfectly silly question!"
exclaimed Jenny Wren scornfully. "Do give us birds credit for a little
common sense. If he were cutting a hole for a nest, everybody within
hearing would know just where to look for it. Downy