BIRDS OF THE PASTURE AND FOREST. 



III. 



THE CUCKOO. 



Our native Cuckoos have not the free-love instinct of 

 the European Cuckoo ; and Daines Barrington would 

 have been delighted to quote their good parental habits 

 as an argument in his special plea for the European bird, 

 whom he considered the victim of slander. The Cow- 

 bird is our Cuckoo in the moral acceptation of the term. 

 The American Cuckoo is attached to its offspring in a 

 remarkable degree, and rears them with all the fidelity 

 of the most devoted parents. In my boyhood, the two 

 severest fights I had with birds on approaching their nests 

 were once when I examined the nest of a Bluejay, and 

 again when I examined one belonging to a Cuckoo. The 

 young Cuckoos were equally savage when I attempted to 

 handle them. Yet this bird bears the reputation of cow- 

 ardice. 



It is remarkable that the American Cuckoo, though a 

 faithful and devoted parent, should have certain peculiar 

 habits connected with laying and hatching, that bear 

 some evidence that the European and American species 

 have a common derivation. The habit of the European 

 bird of dropping its eggs into other birds' nests is proba- 

 bly connected with continued laying, extended to a greater 

 length of time than with other birds. The same fertil- 

 ity has been observed in the American Cuckoos. Mr. 

 Audubon mentions the peculiar habit of these birds of 

 laying fresh eggs and hatching them successively. Thus 



