THE CUCKOO 165 



watched ten or a dozen little marsh birds buzzing round 

 a young cuckoo. According to local tradition, most marsh- 

 birds will feed the young cuckoo as if he were the king 

 of birds, but I have never observed this fact. And when 

 the polygamous males have made enough love, and the 

 careless females have deposited enough eggs, for each bird 

 lays several eggs, to judge by the survivors, they go flying 

 about the marshes, the males whistling and babbling 

 through their quiet, strange existence. At this season you 

 may see them hunting for caterpillars as late as nine or 

 half-past nine of the evening, when the grasshopper warblers 

 are grinding and the partridges calling on the uplands ; 

 and well may they whistle, for they have no cares, never 

 feeding their young, or indeed keeping in their neighbour- 

 hood. And at the end of July they go, leaving the dark 

 silent youngsters to the mercy of their foster-parents and 

 friends, finally, in their turn, to find their way across the seas 

 alone, unless they are born "with nawigation," as the fenmen 

 say, for they are regular " chummys " of the marsh-mowers, 

 sitting on their forks, upon osier-stubbs a favourite seat 

 or upon a heap of newly-poled stuff, sorting their feathers 

 and uttering " cuckoo," sometimes until they are quite 

 hoarse ; or, if disturbed, they will gurgle or chuckle, or they 

 will fly off and alight with spread wings and upturned tail 

 on the wall, calling " cu-cu-cu-cu-cuckoo " or " coo-cuck-oo " 

 another bird answering across the green sea of marsh- 

 land ; and chummy though he be, if he fly along the white 

 road, winding away amongst the green hedgerows, ahead of 

 the home-returning marsh -mower, the fenman is sad and 

 solemn, for it's a rockstaff that there will be a death in his 

 family. 



And in September, when the fenmen tread the purple 

 loosestrife, and the upland and the marshland are turning 

 sere and yellow and grey with the colour of decay, the young 

 cuckoos start without compass or leader across the unknown 

 sea, leaving their parents, the affectionate little titlarks or 



