CUCULUS CANORUS. 513 



and dragon flies, maggots, and seeds of such fruits as 

 gooseberries, currants, and cranberries. Its feet are the 

 same as those of the woodpeckers and wryneck — two before 

 and two behind — the tarsi very short. Its peculiar two- 

 noted song of cuc-koo is welcomed as the harbinger of 

 summer, and carries with it a feeling of pleasure to boy and 

 man alike, as " one touch of Nature makes the whole world 

 kin." Therefore : — 



" Hail ! beauteous stranger of the grove, 

 Attendant on the Spring, 

 Now heaven repairs thy rural seat, 

 And woods thy welcome ring. 



Soon as the daisy decks the green, 



Thy certain voice we hear. 

 Hast thou a star to guide thy path, 



Or mark the rolling year ? 



Delightful visitant, with thee 



I hail the time of flowers, 

 When heaven is filled with music sweet 



Of birds among the bowers. 



The schoolboy, wandering in the woods 



To pull the flowers so gay, 

 Starts, thy curious voice to hear, 



And imitates thy lay." 



Named after its cry — like cheap American clocks — for, 

 observant and subservient trade has enlisted its plaintive cry 

 of cuc-koo into its useful, if somewhat greedy service ; and the 

 singular habit of inserting its eggs into the nests of other birds 

 — in breach of connubial ties — has created the offensive matri- 

 monial word, cuckold. Be that as it may, it is found broadcast 

 over Britain. I have heard it in every wooded district about St 

 Andrews. Its favourite resorts are parks and plantations 

 bordering pasture, but even on rocky hills, bleak moors, or 

 ferny braes its pleasing note is heard. Wordsworth, in his 

 description of the lowly vale near Blea Tarn — that "quiet tree- 

 less nook" — exclaims — 



"Where the small birds find in Spring no thicket 

 To shroud them ; only from the neighbouring vales, 

 The cuckoo, straggling up to the hill tops, 

 JShoweth faint tidings of some gladder place." 



And Tennyson declares — 



" To left and right 

 The cuckoo told his name to all the hills." 



