38 
There is only one recorded instance of the cap- 
ture of a Great-spotted Cuckoo in Great Britain. 
It was taken on the island of Omah, in the county 
of Galway, about Christmas, 1843, it having taken 
refuge in a stone fence or wall from the attack of 
Hawks. This solitary specimen is now in the 
Museum of Trinity College, Dublin. 
CUCKOO, YELLOW-BILLED. 
CucuLus cINEROSUS, Temm. 
There are several instances of this species having 
been killed in Great Britain, The Yellow-billed 
Cuckoo, unlike our Common Cuckoo, builds its 
own nest and attends to its offspring with great 
assiduity ; but it is said to rob smaller birds of 
their eggs, and its own are occasionally found in 
the nests of others of the feathered tribe. Wilson, 
in his American Ornithology, says:—‘‘ Early in 
‘“ May they begin to pair, when obstinate battles 
“take place among the males. About the tenth 
“of that month they commence building. The 
“nest is usually fixed among the horizontal 
“ branches of an apple tree; sometimes in a 
“ solitary thorn, crab, or cedar, in some retired 
“part of the woods. It is constructed with little 
“art, and scarcely any concavity, of small sticks 
“and twigs, intermixed with green weeds and 
