264 Wild Life in a Southern County 



peculiarly soothing effect on the ear. Swifts usually fly 

 at a great height, and, being scattered in the atmosphere, 

 do not appear numerous; but sometimes during a stiff 

 gale they descend and concentrate over an open field, there 

 wheeling round and to and fro only just above the grass. 

 Then the ground looks quite black with them as they dart 

 over it : they exhibit no fear, but if you stand in the midst 

 come all round you so close that they might be knocked 

 down with a walking-stick if used quick enough. In the 

 air they do not look large, but when so near as this they 

 are seen to be of considerable size. The appearance of 

 hundreds of these jet black, long-winged birds, flying with 

 marvellous rapidity, and threading an inextricable maze 

 almost, as it were, under foot, is very striking. 



The proverbial present of a white elephant is paralleled 

 in bird life by the gift of the cuckoo's egg. The bird whose 

 nest is chosen never deserts the strange changeling, but 

 seems to feel feeding the young cuckoo to be a sacred duty, 

 and sees its own young ejected and perishing without 

 apparent concern. . My attention was called one spring to 

 a robin's nest made in a stubble rick ; there chanced to be 

 a slight hollow in the side of the rick, and this had been 

 enlarged. A cuckoo laid her egg in the nest, and as it 

 happened to be near some cowsheds it was found and 

 watched. When the young bird began to get fledged 

 some sticks were inserted in the rick so as to form a cage, 

 that it might not escape, and there the cuckoo grew to 

 maturity and to full feather. 



All the while the labour undergone by the robins in 

 supplying the wide throat of the cuckoo with food was 

 something incredible. It was only necessary to wait a 

 very few minutes before one or other came, but the 

 voracious creature seemed never satisfied ; he was bigger 



