334 Observations on the Cuckoo. 



many different observers, that it would be mere tautology 

 here to repeat it all : one person alone, who was long a game- 

 keeper, and whom I know to be a most correct observer, not 

 at all addicted to making out wonders, assures me that he 

 has found the cuckoo's egg alone, as many as six or seven 

 times, in various nests ; and, in all the cases I have ever known 

 of its being found together with other eggs, these latter were 

 invariably below their average number.* I select, however, the 

 following cases to be placed beside that of Mr. Hoy (p. 294.) : 

 the first is upon the authority of a gentleman in this neigh- 

 bourhood. A meadow pipit's nest was found with four eggs 

 in it; and, on my friend going to look at it two or three days 

 afterwards, the pipit's eggs had all disappeared, and a cuckoo's 

 egg was in their place. The broken shells of the others were 

 found at a short distance. The next was made known to me 

 by a birds'-nesting boy, of whom I purchased the cuckoo's 

 egg. He found a meadow pipit's nest with two eggs in it; 

 and, going to look at it the next day, these had disappeared, 

 and a cuckoo's egg was in the nest alone : the following day 

 the pipit laid an egg to this, and the day after that another, 

 when he took the nest, and brought it to me. I do not con- 

 ceive it necessary to mention any more similar facts, of which 

 I have several, for these I consider to be conclusive ; but 

 I may here fairly ask the question, whence could the common 

 and very prevalent opinion of the cuckoo sucking birds' eggs 

 have been derived, if not from repeated observation of this 

 fact, of her usually destroying the other eggs of a nest into 

 which she deposits her own ?f 



In those cases which would appear to militate against the 

 above, as in that of Montagu, where " the hedge chanter had 

 four eggs when the cuckoo dropped in a fifth," [and those in 

 p. 285. 287., in which the wagtails had the usual number of 

 their own eggs, besides the cuckoo's,] and especially in those 

 where two cuckoos' eggs have been found in the same nest 

 (p. 289, 290.):f, it is highly probable that the cuckoo had been 

 disturbed, perhaps by the rightful owners of the nests, before 



* I have since heard of one instance of six young meadow pipits being 

 taken in the same nest with a young cuckoo : all were, of course, but 

 newly hatched. 



f Goldsmith, it may be remarked, was fully aware of this fact. See his 

 Animated Nature, 



J A person has since informed me, that he once found two cuckoos' 

 eggs in a blackbird's nest which he took : there were no other eggs with 

 them. From this and other instances, it would therefore seem, that the 

 cuckoo knows the egg of her own species, and does not destroy it; a 

 further proof, also, that she never destroys (hardly looks at, probably,) the 

 eggs of her dupe before depositing her own : otherwise it would appear 

 very strange that she should ever lay another egg beside the one belonging 

 to her own species. 



