Dryobates villosus. Descriptions of First Plumage of Certain North Am. Bbs. Wm.Brewster. 92. Picus villosus.* First plumage: male. Forehead spotted thickly with white; crown dull scarlet, each feather subterminally spotted with white; nuchal crescent entirely wanting. Rest of upper parts dull dead black, marked and spotted with white as in the adult. Loress yellowish-white, maxillary line very faintly indicated. Beneath soiled yellowish-white. From a specimen in my collection shot at Upton, Me., August 1, 1874. The first plumage of this species is exceedingly evanescent. The scarlet patch upon the crown is soon lost, the feathers dropping out one by one; a few scattered ones, however, usually remain until the feathers of the nuchal crescent have begun to appear. A female in first plumage (Upton, Me., August 20, 1874) differs so little from adults as scarcely to require a detailed description. The black of the upper parts, as in the male just described, is of a dead or plumbous cast. The crown is entirely unspotted. I have, however, seen specimens which had the forehead spotted with white. * As stated elsewhere, the young of most, if not all of the Woodpeckers, regularly moult the wing and tail feathers with the rest of the first plumage. No exceptions to this rule occur among large series of the common North American species examined, and it may probably be found to hold good among all excepting, perhaps, some highly specialized groups. Another peculiar feature in the early development of the species most thoroughly investigated, and one which is perhaps common to all the members of this family, is the fact that a certain proportion of the females in first plumage possess to a greater or less degree the adornments which in more advanced stages are peculiar to the males alone, and which are lost with the first moult. Marked examples of this are afforded by young females of Colaptes auratus, Picus pubescens, and others, of which detailed descriptions are given in the text. Bull. N.O.C. 3, Oct., 1878, p. 179.