INSTINCTS. 165 



sicus), that the phenomenon depends upon 

 imitation, and that the young birds follow 

 the old ones who have before made the same 

 flight. But I will select the young cuckoo for 

 an unexceptionable example of the instinctive 

 nature of this quality. He is produced from 

 an egg deposited by his mother in the nest of an- 

 other bird, generally the hedge sparrow. He 

 destroys all the other young ones hatched in 

 the same nest, and is supplied with food by his 

 foster-parent, after he has deprived her of all 

 her natural offspring. Quite solitary, he is no 

 sooner able to fly than he quits the country of 

 his birth, and finds his way, with no other 

 guide than his instinct, to a land where his 

 parents had gone many weeks before him; and 

 he is not pressed to make this migration by 

 want of food, for the insects and grains on 

 which he feeds are still abundant. The whole 

 history of the origin, education, and migration 

 of this singular animal, is a history of a suc- 

 cession of instincts, the more remarkable, be- 

 cause in many respects contrary to the usual 

 order of nature. 



PHYS. I have been accustomed to refer 

 M 3 



