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Meadow Pipits with food in its bill : so I passed round 

 to the other side of the tree and watched to see where 

 it took the food. I had not long to wait before the 

 bird dropped in the grass about twenty yards away. I 

 marked the spot and at once made for it, and to my 

 surprise I found the nest to contain a young Cuckoo 

 about a fortnight old. It was such a fine fellow I 

 could not resist putting it in my handkerchief and 

 taking it home, where I placed it in an old Blackbirds' 

 nest, in a box. I made up a mixture of crushed 

 biscuits and ants' eggs, but could not get it to feed 

 that day. It hissed at me every time I attempted to 

 give it food. Next morning I had to cram it, but 

 before midday it began to gape and take the food all 

 right. 



After a few days I put it in a large cage. It 

 became very tame, always sitting on ni}^ hand while 

 being fed. This went on until it was about a month 

 old, when I got tired of feeding it, so I put it in a cage 

 along with a Thrush that had fed and reared two 

 young Thrushes that season : the Thrush began to feed 

 it almost at once. It was very lazy, seldom moving off 

 its perch, and when it did it moved about very 

 clumsily : all it thought about was feeding. After 

 the Thrush had fed it for a week it made no signs of 

 feeding itself, so I put it back into its own cage to see 

 if I could get it to pick up for itself. I tried all sorts 

 of dodges with house-beetles, mealworms, and large 

 blow-flies. It would come down on the bottom of the 

 cage and pick them up in its bill, but seemed to have 

 no idea how to get them down : and then would drop 

 them and return to the perch. This went on for two 

 days, during which time I only fed it four times, 

 determined if possible to make it learn to feed itself. 

 The third day I tried it again, but with no more 

 success, so I gave it a good feed, and took it to the 

 same spot whence I obtained it and turned it out on 



