THE CUCKOO 



89 



some time after they leave the nest the young of all birds are 

 attended with almost undiminished care by one or both 

 parents; but this solicitude of the old birds for their fledged 

 offspring is doubly conspicuous in the case of a young cuckoo 

 owing to its large size. The strangeness of the whole 

 situation is emphasised afresh when we see a pair of diminu- 



'a pair of diminutive meadow-pipits' 



tive meadow-pipits, worn and shabby with the labour they 

 have already gone through, busily ministering to a full-grown 

 but clumsy and dependent young cuckoo on the July moors. 

 The young bird is now many times their own size, but still 

 keeps a thin nestling cry, which recalls in its disproportionate 

 shrillness the notes of young gulls at the same time of year. 

 The extreme hunger and helplessness of the young giant seem 

 to keep the nursing instincts of the parents active beyond 

 their normal time, so that the devotion of the foster-parents 

 of a young cuckoo appears greater than they display towards 

 their own brood in more fortunate seasons. Next year they 



(L 922) » ? 



