BIRDS AND BIRDS 129 



eggs out to be hatched, as does our cow blackbird, 

 and our cuckoo is master of only the rudiments of 

 nest-building. No other bird in the woods builds 

 so shabby a nest ; it is the merest makeshift, — a 

 loose scaffolding of twigs through which the eggs can 

 be seen. One season, I knew of a pair that built 

 within a few feet of a country house that stood in 

 the midst of a grove, but a heavy storm of rain and 

 wind broke up the nest. 



If the Old World cuckoo had been as silent and 

 retiring a bird as ours is, it could never have figured 

 so conspicuously in literature as it does, — having a 

 prominence that we would give only to the bobolink 

 or to the wood thrush, — as witness his frequent 

 mention by Shakespeare, or the following early Eng- 

 lish ballad (in modern guise) : — 



" Summer is come in, 

 Loud sings the cuckoo ; 

 Growetli seed and blofreth mead. 

 And springs the wood now. 



Sing, cuckoo; 

 The ewe bleateth for her lamb, 



The cow loweth for her calf, 



The bullock starteth. 

 The buck verteth, 

 Merrily sings the cuckoo 

 Cuckoo, cuckoo ; 

 Well sings the cuckoo, 

 Mayest thou never cease." 



I think it will be found, on the whole, that the 

 European birds are a more hardy and pugnacious 

 race than ours, and that their song-birds have more 



