Habits of the Cuckoo. 289 



inducing correspondents to contribute to the further elucida- 

 tion, we would here exhibit a recapitulation of certain points, 

 which, though they have received the casual attention of na- 

 turalists, seem never to have been thoroughly investigated and 

 explained. 



" The cuckoo, which bears a strong resemblance to the 

 hawk when on the wing, is certain of a similar retinue where- 

 ever it flies." (Professor Bennie, in I. 374.) These, it may be 

 assumed, are usually composed of one or more of the very 

 species which are made the agents to hatch and rear the 

 cuckoo ; and, as it is admitted on all hands (I. 374. ; IV. 

 415. ; VII. 348.), that the bearing of those small birds which 

 pursue adult cuckoos is, towards them, of the offensive kind, 

 one cannot but be led into instructive considerations on the 

 degree of intellectual capability in birds, on contrasting their 

 manners, while engaged in this pursuit, with those which they 

 manifest towards the infant cuckoos which they rear. The 

 late Rev. L. Guilding had made this note in relation to the 

 mention in I. 374. of the cuckoo's being pursued by small 

 birds : — "It may not be unlikely that the cuckoo is sometimes 

 mistaken, by flocks of birds, for a hawk, to which it bears, at 

 a distance, no trifling resemblance. In the counties of Wor- 

 cester and Gloucester, I have seen it punctually attended by 

 small birds; but these were its foster-parents, the hedge-sparrow 

 or the wagtail, which always fed it till capable of migration. 

 — L. Guilding. St. Vincent, May 1. 1830." 



What is the Number of Eggs laid by the Cuckoo at one Course 

 of layifig ? Does it ever lay more than one Egg in any one 

 Nest ? Does it lay more than one Course of Eggs during its 

 Stay in Britain? — Montagu believed that the number of 

 eggs layed by the cuckoo, at one course of laying, is five or 

 six (Rennie's Mont. Orn. Diet., p. 119.): Professor Rennie 

 has stated it (III. 399.) to be six. These it may be obliged 

 to lay in as many nests of as many species of birds; for, 

 from the aversion which, as we have seen above, small birds 

 manifest towards the adult cuckoo, its deposition of its eggs 

 in the nest of any one of them must be done by stealth, and 

 the favouring opportunity of the absence of the parent birds 

 is less likely to occur twice than once. It is stated in Ren- 

 nie's Mont. Orn. Diet., p. 119., apparently by Montagu, that 

 the cuckoo never lays more than one egg in any one nest, and 

 that " where two have been found in one nest, they certainly 

 were layed by different birds." The grounds of this posi- 

 tion are not given : we beg to leave it for proof or disproof 

 to our correspondents. An instance of finding two cuckoo's 

 eggs in one nest is noticed in V. 278. ; and two instances of 



