FOR NORTHERN INDIA 124 



duties ; their eggs have been taken in every 

 month of the year. 



The nesting season is now at its height for 

 the white-necked storks, the koels and their 

 dupes the house-crows, also for the various 

 babblers and their deceivers the brain-fever 

 birds and the pied crested cuckoos. The 

 tailor-birds, the ashy and the Indian wren- 

 warblers, the brahminy mynas, the wire- 

 tailed swallows, the amadavats, the sirkeer 

 cuckoos, the pea-fowl, the water-hens, the 

 common and the pied mynas, the cuckoo- 

 shrikes and the orioles are all fully occupied 

 with nursery duties. The earliest of the brain- 

 fever birds to be hatched have left the nest. 

 Like all its family the young hawk-cuckoo has 

 a healthy appetite. In order to satisfy it the 

 unfortunate foster-parents have to work like 

 slaves, and often must they wonder why 

 nature has given them so voracious a child. 

 When it sees a babbler approaching with food, 

 the cuckoo cries out and flaps its wings 

 vigorously. Sometimes these completely en- 

 velop the parent bird while it is thrusting 

 food into the yellow mouth of the cuckoo. 

 The breast of the newly-fledged brain-fever 

 bird is covered with dark brown drops, so 



