THE PIE KIND. 209 



be the number of their young, as yet remains for 

 discovery. 



The natives, who make a trade of killing and 

 selling these birds to the Europeans, generally 

 conceal themselves in the trees where they resort, 

 and having covered themselves up from sight in 

 a bower made of the branches, they shoot at the 

 birds with reedy arrows, and, as they assert, if 

 they happen to kill the king, they then have a 

 good chance for killing the greatest part of the 

 flock. The chief mark by which they know the 

 king is by the ends of the feathers in his tail, 

 which have eyes like those of a peacock. When 

 they have taken a number of these birds, their 

 usual method is to gut them and cut off their 

 legs ; they then run a hot iron into the body, 

 which dries up the internal moisture, and filling 

 the cavity with salts and spices, they sell them to 

 the Europeans for a perfect trifle. 



CHAPTER VI. 



THE CUCKOO, AND ITS VARIETIES. 



FROM a bird of which many fables have been re- 

 ported, we pass to another that has not given 

 less scope to fabulous invention. The note of 

 the Cuckoo is known to all the world ; the history 

 and nature of the bird itself still remains in great 

 VOL. iv. o 



