The Broken Egg-Shells. 109 



XIII. 



Darwin himself well points out that "it is sur- 

 prising instinct should lead small nesting birds to 

 remove their broken eggs — (it should surely have 

 been egg shells) — and the early mutings ; whereas 

 with partridges, the young of which immediately 

 follow their parents, the broken eggs — (it should 

 surely have been egg shells), are left round the nest." 

 More often they are left in it, or a portion of them. 

 The protection of the partridge, which nests on 

 the ground, or very close to it, lies in the power 

 of her brood to run, if disturbed, even on being 

 hatched ; the partridge at once leading the young 

 ones to protective holes, and under cover of hedge 

 bottoms, etc., so that the removal of broken egg 

 shells is not particularly necessary, considering other 

 protective points ; but it is of importance — of the 

 utmost importance — to nestlings which are unfledged 

 and cannot move from the nest for many days : and 

 I think it one of the most extraordinary things that 

 Mr, Darwin never seems to have in the least con- 

 nected this remarkable fact with the necessity, in the 

 small birds, of non-simultaneity of hatching.='= 



Major Bendire has this passage in one of his able 

 articles : " It is said" (Origin of Species, chap, viii), 

 " that the American cuckoo lays at long intervals, 

 and has eggs and young at the same time in its nest, 

 a circumstance manifestly disadvantageous. Of the 

 Coccyzus melanocoryphus, I can say that it never 

 begins to incubate till the full complement of eggs 



* Romanes' Mental Evolution, appendix, p. 379. 



