286 ANIMALS AT WORK AND PLA Y 



unusual in itself; but the circumstances were such 

 as to suggest a doubt whether the cuckoo is as clever 

 as is supposed. The place was a perfect site for the 

 smaller common birds to build. A spring broke 

 out in a sloping meadow, filling a deep pool, while 

 the high banks were surrounded with pollard willows, 

 tall elms, and low ivy-covered stumps and bushes. 

 But the long frost of last January had killed off 

 nearly all the indigenous birds, except a few thrushes, 

 whose nests had been robbed by the village boys. 

 In the ivy growing on a pollard with a thorn bush 

 round its trunk, was a hedge-sparrow's nest, so 

 ragged and dilapidated that it was obviously deserted, 

 though the moss of which it was built was still green 

 enough to suggest that it might be a nest of the year. 

 The lining was out of place, and filled the inner cup 

 with untidy rubbish. No birdsnester, certainly no 

 sensible bird, would have given a second look at it, 

 viewed in the light of a ' going concern.' The writer 

 felt in the untidy lining to ascertain if the young had 

 been hatched out, in which case some fragments of 

 shell might have been left at the bottom. Instead, 

 deep among the dishevelled lining, was an egg. It 

 was a fresh cuckoo's egg, just laid. It could never 

 have been hatched, and it was clearly a case, perhaps 

 one of many, in which cuckoo tactics lead to failure. 

 This was not the only curiosity in the nest. It was 



