196 NATURAL HISTORY 



Induced by this assertion, we procured a cuckoo ; and, cut- 

 ting open the breast-bone, and exposing the intestines to sight, 

 found the crop lying as mentioned above. This stomach was 

 large and round, and stuffed hard like a pincushion with food, 

 which, upon nice examination, we found to consist of various 

 insects ; such as small scarabs, spiders, and dragon-flies ; the 

 last of which we have seen cuckoos catching on the wing as 

 they were just emerging out of the aurelia state. Among 

 this farrago also were to be seen maggots, and many seeds, 

 which belonged either to gooseberries, currants, cranberries, 

 or some such fruit ; so that these birds apparently subsist on 

 insects and fruits : nor was there the least appearance of bones, 

 feathers, or fur to support the idle notion of their being birds 

 of prey. 



The sternum in this bird seemed to us to be remarkably 

 short, between which and the anus lay the crop, or craw, and 

 immediately behind that the bowels against the back-bone. 



It must be allowed as this anatomist observes, that the crop 

 placed just upon the bowels must, especially when full, be in 

 a very uneasy situation during the business of incubation ; 

 yet the test will be to examine whether birds that are actually 

 known to sit for certain are not formed in a similar manner. 

 This inquiry I proposed to myself to make with a fern-owl, 

 or goatsucker, as soon as opportunity offered : because, if 

 their formation proves the same, the reason for incapacity in 

 the cuckoo will be allowed to have been taken up somewhat 

 hastily. 



Not long after a fern-owl was procured, which, from it's 

 habit and shape, we suspected might resemble the cuckoo in 

 it's internal construction. Nor were our suspicions ill- 

 grounded; for, upon the dissection, the crop, or craw, also 

 lay behind the sternum, immediately on the viscera, between 

 them and the skin of the belly. It was bulky, and stuffed 

 hard with large phalcence^ moths of several sorts, and their 

 eggs, which no doubt had been forced out of those insects by 

 the action of swallowing. 



Now as it appears that this bird, which is so well known 

 to practise incubation, is formed in a similar manner with 



