CUCKOW. 391 



be proved. There is abundant evidence that the nest chosen 

 by the Cuckow is often so situated, or so built, that it 

 would be an absolute impossibility for a bird of her size to 

 lay her egg therein by sitting upon or in the fabric, as birds 

 commonly do,* yet so much caution is used by the Cuckow 

 in her selection that the act of inserting the egg has been 

 but seldom witnessed. It is not allowable to assume that 

 the practice is always followed, but there have been a few 

 fortunate observers that have actually seen the laying of her 

 egg on the ground by the hen Cuckow, who then taking it 

 into her bill has introduced it into the nest though whether 

 she had previously found and surveyed the nest, or not, is 

 another point on which no opinion has been reached. 

 Among such observers of one part of the operation, so far 

 as our own country is concerned, the earliest seem to have 

 been two sons of Mr. Tripeny, of Coxmuir, who informed 

 Weir, as recorded by Macgillivray (Br. B. iii. p. 130), that 

 as they were tending cattle on June 24th, 1838, they saw a 

 Cuckow alight on a hillock near them. " It picked up an 

 egg with its bill, and after having looked round about as if 

 to ascertain whether there was any one in sight, it hopped 

 down with it amongst the heath. The lads immediately ran 

 to the place into which they had observed it descend, and 

 when at the distance of about six feet, they saw it rise 

 from the side of a titlark's nest into which it had intro- 

 duced its head. In the nest, which was arched over with 

 strong heath, and had a narrow entrance from the side, 

 there was a newly dropped Cuckoo's egg along with one of 

 the titlark's own." But perhaps the most satisfactory 

 evidence on the point is that of Herr Adolf Mliller, a 

 forester at Gladenbach in Darmstadt, who says (Zool. Gar- 

 ten, 1866, p. 374) that through a telescope he watched a 

 Cuckow as she laid her egg on a bank and then saw her 

 slope her head to the ground, take the egg in her widely- 

 opened bill and carry it to a Wagtail's nest close at hand, in 

 which he immediately afterwards found it. 



* Young Cuckows too have more than once been found in a nest whence it was 

 not easy to see how they could escape. 



VOL. IT. 3 E 



