VIEWS CONCERNING CUCKOOS 



and " warningly coloured " of caterpillars, the koel 

 is a pure vegetarian. This bird in its several species 

 is widely ranging in the East, but belongs entirely to 

 the eastern hemisphere. Its name is plainly onomato- 

 poeic. Its voice is melodious, and we are informed that 

 it is used by the youthful oriental as a comparison 

 standard of the voice of his beloved as is its plumage 

 of her beauty. But on the other hand it is black of 

 heart like other cuckoos, and leaves to others the care 

 of bringing up its offspring. This cuckoo lays its eggs 

 for choice in the nests of the Indian crow (Corvus 

 splendens), and it is remarkable that the wiliest among 

 Indian birds does not frustrate its unbidden guest. 

 Its eggs, too, are like those of the crow in colour, though 

 smaller ; it is said that the newly hatched cuckoo ejects 

 its foster brethren in the good old fashion of the British 

 cuckoo. It diverges from its ally in this country in 

 the fact that it is not migratory, and is entirely stay-at- 

 home. Some would write the name cuckoo " cuckow," 

 a reversion to an older, but not in our opinion " more 

 scholarly," method of orthography. For as the word 

 is, like the word " koel, " distinctly formed in imitation 

 of the note of the bird itself, other old transliterations 

 might be invoked. Thus we might insist upon calling 

 the bird " Gukgo," and indeed that word is a trifle more 

 suggestive of the bird when he " alters his tune " in 

 June. There are at least two remarkable facts about 

 the cuckoo tribe, with the outlines of which every one 

 is acquainted, and about which it is necessary to say 

 something. The parasitical habits have been known 

 from the remotest antiquity. The knowledge of the 

 same has gradually accumulated, but there are still 

 problems that require solution. It is always mentioned 

 as a curiosity of the history of Natural History, that 

 the habits of the cuckoo were largely elucidated by the 

 discoverer of vaccination, Jenner. What the cuckoo 



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