LECTURE VII. 319 



When the mother must seek her food, and 

 be absent from her nursery, the young are 

 born with scarcely any vision ; whilst others 

 have such perfect senses and powers as to 

 be able to accompany their mother in 

 search of food. The most helpless and 

 imperfect offspring is that of the human 

 race ; but the long nursing which is re- 

 quired, creates and strengthens reciprocal 

 attachment between it and its parents, 

 which continues throughout life ; so that 

 according to the laws of Nature, chil- 

 dren are disposed to return such kind at- 

 tentions when age shall have reduced their 

 parents to feebleness and second child- 

 hood. How opposite to all this is the 

 mode by which the cuckoo species is con- 

 tinued? The parent has no solicitude 

 about its young; yet Nature has taught 

 it to ensure the continuance of the species 

 by depositing its egg in other birds' nests. 

 How curious is it that the just hatched 

 cuckoo should have peculiar appendages 

 to its wings, with which it can confine 

 the legitimate offspring against the sides 

 of the nest, and that it should possess in- 



