296 Habits of the Cuckoo. 



cuckoo was hatched, two young hedge-sparrows were also 

 excluded ; and that, on his return from work in the evening, 

 nothing was left in the nest but the cuckoo. At five or six 

 days old I took it to my house, where I frequently saw it 

 throw out the young swallow for four or five days after. This 

 singular action was performed by insinuating itself under the 

 swallow, and, with its rump, forcing it out of the nest with 

 a sort of jerk. Sometimes, indeed, it failed, after much strug- 

 gling, by reason of the strength of the swallow, which was 

 nearly full-feathered ; but, after a small respite from the seem- 

 ing fatigue, it renewed its efforts, and seemed continually 

 restless till it succeeded. At the end of the fifth day this 

 disposition ceased, and it suffered the swallow to remain in 

 the nest unmolested." The instance related in p. 285. of the 

 present Number, of all the young wagtails being found dead 

 out of and near the nest, which they had shortly previous 

 occupied alive, and which a young cuckoo was then occupying 

 alive, and alone, with the exception of an abortive egg, is one 

 adducible, without violence, in proof of the fatal effects on the 

 progeny of its foster-parents of its own efforts to attain ease. 

 That the parent wagtails did not discard from their nest their 

 own young, from finding that all the inmates of the nest could 

 not be accommodated, is assumptively proved by the cases 

 detailed by Mr. Turner, in p. 287. and 288., in which two 

 pair of wagtails had had the happiness to sustain their young 

 for a longer time, collaterally with young cuckoos, under their 

 care in the same nests. 



As to food, those pairs of parent birds who have a young 

 cuckoo and a brood of their own young to sustain cannot, we 

 have said, supply to each individual of their charge the propor- 

 tion proper to it. We said not this under the impression that 

 they would not be able to collect a quantity sufficient (though 

 of this we have now serious doubt ; and Mr. Turner's facts, 

 in p. 287., favour that doubt), but in the belief that parent 

 birds, in feeding their charge, observe no such rule as dealing 

 a share to each in succession; but that they collect the food 

 with wonderful diligence, and bestow it with great assiduity, 

 but without selecting the individuals to which they shall 

 impart it. Those, we think, receive most of it who press for- 

 wardest, gape widest, or clamour loudest. If this view be 

 admitted, it will also be admitted that the size and strength of 

 the young cuckoo give it great advantage over its smaller com- 

 panions : and we believe that we dare answer for the voracity 

 of its appetite prompting it to make every effort in its power 

 to attain satiety. 



Instinct may be defined as, perhaps, passive agency. In 



