24 General Notes on the Cuckoo. 



birds. It is quite a common event to find that of 

 four or five eggs laid by a nest builder, one or two 

 will differ considerably from the others in form, size, 

 or colour — perhaps in all these particulars." 



It is a popular belief in Norfolk that whatever 

 you are doing the first time you hear the Cuckoo 

 you will do the most frequently all the year. 

 Another belief is that an unmarried person will re- 

 main single as many years as the Cuckoo, when first 

 heard, utters its call. Milton says in his sonnet to 

 the Nightingale — 



Thy liquid notes, that close the eye of day, 

 First heard before the shallow Cuckoo's bill 

 Portend success in love. 



Heywood, in his epigram ''Of Use" (1587), thus 

 alludes to the remarkable change of note in the 

 Cuckoo — 



In x^pril, the Koocoo can sing her song by note ; 



In June, of tune she cannot sing a note ; 



At first, koocoo, koocoo, sing still can she do ; 



At last kooke, kooke, kooke — six kookes to one koocoo. 



The following from an article in the Musical 

 Courier, by Charles Lunn, will be read with inter- 



