140 COCCYZUS AMERICAN US. 



two eggs, one containing a chick, the other newly laid. Mr 

 Rhett stated that in another nest " eleven young birds had 

 been successively hatched and reared by the same pair, in one 

 season, and that young birds and eggs were to be seen in it at 

 the same time for many weeks in succession." Dr T. M. 

 Brewer, of Boston, corroborates this statement, observing that 

 " the female evidently commences incubation immediately 

 after laying her first egg. Thus 1 have found in the nest of 

 both our Cuckoos one egg quite fresh, while in another the 

 chick will be just bursting the shell ; and again, I have found 

 an egg just about to be hatched, while others are already so, 

 and some of the young even about to fly." 



Now the stomach of both this species and the Black-billed, 

 which incubate and rear their young, being as large as that of 

 our European Cuckoo, and their food the same, namely hairy 

 worms and insects, the reasoning founded on these facts to ex- 

 plain the peculiar habits of the latter bird, is obviously false. 

 This succession of eggs and young in the same nest at consi- 

 derable intervals, is one of the most curious phenomena in the 

 history of birds, and nearly as marvellous as that which has 

 rendered so celebrated the Grey Cuckoo. 



An individual of this species was killed in the preserves of 

 Lord Cawdor, in Wales, in the autumn of 1882, and is now 

 in the museum of the Zoological Society of London. Another 

 is stated to have been obtained in Cornwall, and Ireland has 

 furnished two more. The species thus merely ranks with us 

 as a very rare straggler. 



Remarks. — Mr Jenyns calls the tarsi of this bird " long," 

 although by his own statement they measure not quite an inch. 

 In the second part of a popular compilation entitled " The 

 Natural History of the Birds of Great Britain and Ireland," 

 published in October 1839, it is said that " for all that we 

 know of its habits we are indebted to Alexander Wilson." 

 On the contrary, all that is related above of its habits is derived 

 from John James Audubon. 



