Wizard Cuckoos 55 



can equally well put out its young to nurse with the 

 titlark of the mountain-side and the reed-warbler 

 of the lowland morasses need never be deterred 

 from travel by the thought of domestic encum- 

 brances ; and, since the ties of matrimony lie 

 still more lightly upon the cuckoo than those of 

 parentage, it is not even subject to the slight 

 inconvenience of being compelled to wait for a 

 partner. So far as any instinctive compulsion 

 directs their movements, cuckoos seem to be subject 

 only to the kind of local attraction which draws 

 most migrant birds to the same spots year by 

 year. 



It is as the " wandering voice," and not as the 

 bird of peculiar and notorious habits, that the 

 cuckoo exercises its widest attraction. Its primary 

 appeal is to the ear, as that of its fellow-herald 

 of spring, the swallow, is to the eye ; and for many 

 people its mystery, even when the bird is seen, is 

 safeguarded by its likeness to a sparrow-hawk, and 

 by the still prevalent belief that the cuckoo is the 

 double body into which the hawk turns for the 

 summer. This belief is probably a very ancient 

 human heritage. In common with many other 

 superstitions, it was mentioned in his Natural 

 History by Aristotle, who accurately pointed out 

 that the cuckoo's head and claws are very unlike 

 those of a hawk, and added that, although the 

 hawk which the cuckoo resembles is generally not 

 to be seen when the cuckoo is present, yet they 

 have been seen together. Whilst the first cuckoo 

 was calling among the snow-patches on the hills 



