144 CUCKOO. 



their subsistence might be ; all that I could ever 

 find was a soft mucus, among which lay many pel- 

 lucid small gravels. 



IV. 



YOUR observation, that " the cuckoo does not 

 deposit its egg indiscriminately in the nest of the 

 first bird that comes in its way, but probably looks 

 out a nurse in some degree congenerous, with 

 whom to intrust its young," is perfectly new to 

 me ; and struck me so forcibly, that I naturally 

 fell into a train of thought that led me to consider 

 whether the fact was so, and what reason there 

 was for it. When I came to recollect and inquire, 

 I could not find that any cuckoo had ever been 

 seen in these parts, except in the nest of the 

 wagtail, the hedge-sparrow, the titlark, the white- 

 throat, and the red-breast, all soft-billed insec- 

 tivorous birds. The excellent Mr. Willughby 

 mentions the nest of the palumbus (ring-dove), 

 and of the fringilla (chaffinch), birds that subsist 

 on acorns and grains, and such hard food; but 

 then he does not mention them as of his own 

 knowledge ; but says afterwards, that he saw 

 himself a wagtail feeding a cuckoo. It appears 

 hardly possible that a soft-billed bird should 

 subsist on the same food with the hard-billed ; for 

 the former have thin membranaceous stomachs 

 suited to their soft food; while the latter, the 

 granivorous tribe, have strong muscular gizzards, 

 which, like mills, grind, by the help of small gravels 

 and pebbles, what is swallowed. This proceeding 

 of the cuckoo, of dropping its eggs as it were by 

 chance, is such a monstrous outrage on maternal 

 affection, one of the first great dictates of nature, 

 and such a violence on instinct, that, had it only 



