Sir W. BuUer's Views. 203 



charge, whose constant piping cry served only to 

 stimulate their activity." 



Sir W. Buller adds (p. 29) that an egg of this 

 cuckoo, taken years ago from a grey warbler's nest 

 by himself in the Maruka scrub, was of a pale creamy 

 colour, and " another, which was laid by a captive 

 bird in my possession, is pure white." 



Now, here the question arises, how has the shining 

 cuckoo come to be so much smaller, and to have an 

 egg so much smaller than its relative, the long-tailed 

 cuckoo ? Is the latter only on the way, by a small 

 instalment, to the point which the shining cuckoo has 

 secured, or what ? Has the shining cuckoo out- 

 stripped its congeners in the race because of more 

 cleverness, adaptability, or what ? Or has the long 

 tailed cuckoo, more astute than he seems, discovered 

 a short cut, and finding that by it he can fully secure 

 his object, does not need nor want to go any further. 

 If certain little birds can be found — as indeed we have 

 some grounds for thinking is the case with certain of 

 them in this country — ready to nurse and feed the 

 young cuckoo, though they have not brooded him, 

 then does it not seem rather a waste of energy and 

 knowledge that our cuckoos have not taken more 

 advantage of it, and caused themselves all the effort 

 and pain which cannot but have been associated with 

 the process, gradual and long continued, by which 

 the egg was reduced from normal size to the size we 

 now find it ? 



The egg-eating on the part of the long-tailed cuckoo 

 and his being mobbed by little birds as the cuckoos 

 are in this country, anew and from another point, 

 emphasizes the question whether at a certain stage in 



