PLATE I 

 CUCKOO. Cucuhis canorus. 



May I7//Z, 1894. While walking along the shore of the Lake of Monteith, 

 Perthshire, one day, I saw a Cuckoo rise from the ground in front of me 

 hotly pursued by a pair of Reed Buntings. On searching the spot, I found 

 a nest of the latter species with a Cuckoo's egg in it. 



The egg was pinkish buff in ground-colour, minutely speckled all over with 

 brownish marks, and was evidently intended to have been deposited in a Tree 

 Pipit's nest, as it was almost identical in colour with a clutch of eggs I took 

 the same day not a quarter of a mile from this place. The Reed Buntings 

 followed the Cuckoo for nearly half a mile, mobbing it, and did not return 

 to the vicinity of the nest for nearly three-quarters of an hour, though the 

 eggs were well incubated. 



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