180 OMNIVOROUS BIRDS. 



birds to migrate, as the seasons change and as their food 

 begins to fail, have only a periodical influence; and for a 

 while they remain domestic, and pass a portion of their 

 time in the cares and enjoyments of the conjugal state. 

 But with our bird, like the European Cuckoo, this season 

 never arrives ; the flocks live together without ever pair- 

 ing. A general concubinage prevails among them, 

 scarcely exciting any jealousy, and unaccompanied by 

 any durable affection. From the commencement of their 

 race, they have been bred as foundlings, in the nests of 

 other birds, and fed by foster-parents, under the perpet- 

 ual influence of delusion and deception, and by the sac- 

 rifice of the eoncurrent progeny of the nursing birds ! 

 Amongst all the feathered tribes hitherto known, this and 

 the European Cuckoo, with a few other species indigenous 

 to the old continent, are the only kinds who never make 

 a nest or hatch their young. That this character is not 

 a vice of habit, but a perpetual instinct of nature, appears 

 from various circumstances, and from none more evidently 

 than from this, that the eggs of the Cow Troopial are 

 always earlier hatched than those of the foster-parent, a 

 singular and critical provision, on which perhaps the 

 existence of the species depends. For did the natural 

 brood of the deceived parent come first into existence, 

 the strange 'egg, on which they sat, would generally be 

 destroyed. 



The number of nurses selected by this vagrant is 

 somewhat considerable. The greatest favorite appears to 

 be the Red-cycd Fly-catcher, the Wliitc-eycd species, 

 and the Mcirylancl Yclloio-throat ; but the Blue-bird , In- 

 digo-hird, Chipping-Sparroio , Song-Sparrow , Blue-eyed 

 Yellow Warbler, Blue-grey Fly-catcher, Golden-crown- 

 ed and JVihon^s Thrush, are also at times enlisted 

 in the number of foster parents for the black and 



