388 



THE history of the Cuckow has always been a subject of 

 interest not only to ornithologists but to all lovers of Nature, 

 and perhaps no bird has attracted so much attention, while 

 of none have more idle tales been told.* Some of its habits 

 are now well ascertained, but in regard to many of its pre- 

 sumed peculiarities there is still much to be learnt, before 

 our knowledge of them can be deemed satisfactory, while 

 the conflicting testimony offered even by trained and credible 

 observers makes the task of the Cuckow's historian one of 

 the hardest that Ornithology imposes on her followers. Its 

 strange and, according to the experience of most people, its 

 singular custom of depositing its eggs in the nests of other 

 birds, thus freeing itself from the duty of further providing 

 for its offspring, and leaving their education to foster-parents, 

 is enough to account for much of the curiosity that has been 

 felt; but this custom is shared by many of its Old- World 

 relatives, and in America by birds not at all related to it. 

 As to the way in which this parasitism can have originated, 

 nothing save conjecture is to be offered, and that may be so 

 far from the truth as to be hardly worth consideration.! 



Anatomists and physiologists have over and over again 

 taxed their powers to discover the reason of this extra- 

 ordinary custom, but hitherto the various explanations, 

 which have from time to time been offered, can hardly 

 be deemed adequate, and the matter must still be left to 

 the ingenuity of speculative minds. In this work it is 

 desirable to avoid speculation as far as possible, yet it must 

 be owned that some hypothesis is needed to render the 

 Cuckow's history at all intelligible, partly to supply informa- 



* A mere list of the different contributions to the history of this species would 

 probably extend over as many pages as can here be allotted to its consideration. 

 Much of the Cuckow-literature is certainly of little value, and by no means 

 repays the student, but all of it has to be mastered by any one wishing to do 

 justice to the subject. 



t On this subject reference may be made to some remarks in the ' Encyclo- 

 paedia Britannica ' (Ed. 9, iii. p. 772), too long to be here quoted, but it is to be 

 observed that, granting the probability of the ancestors of our parasitic Cuckows, 

 having at some early period habitually built their own nest?, there is of course 

 no evidence of the progenitors of the many species which are now their dupes 

 having ever been their invaders. 



