THE CUCKOO 



her, she could always find one at a few 

 moments' notice. Some people, who are 

 never so happy as when making the wonders 

 of Nature seem still more wonderful than 

 they really are, have declared that the cuckoo 

 lays eggs to match those among which she 

 deposits them, or that, at any rate, she 

 chooses the nests of birds whose eggs ap- 

 proximately resemble her own. I should have 

 liked to believe this, but am unfortunately 

 debarred by the memory of about forty 

 cuckoo's eggs that I took, seven-and-twenty 

 summers ago, in the woods round Dartford 

 Heath. The majority of these were found in 

 hedgesparrows' nests, and the absolute dis- 

 similarity between the great spotted egg of 

 the cuckoo and the little blue egg of its so- 

 called dupe would have impressed even a 

 colour-blind animal. Occasionally, I believe, 

 a blue cuckoo's egg has been found, but such 

 a freak could hardly be the result of design. 

 As a matter of fact, there is no need for any 

 such elaborate deception. Up to the moment 

 of hatching, the little foster-parents have in 

 all probability no suspicion of the trick that 

 has been played on them. Birds do not take 

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