GUIRA CUCKOO 19 



both to sight and smell. There is something 

 ludicrous in the notes of these young birds, resem- 

 bling as they do the shrill half-hysterical lat^hter 

 of a female exhausted by over-indulgence in mirth. 

 One summer there was a large brood in a tree close 

 to my home, and every time we heard the parent 

 bird hastening to her nest with food in her beak, 

 and uttering her plaintive cries, we used to run to 

 the door to hear them. As soon as the old bird 

 reached the nest they would burst forth into such 

 wild extravagant peals and continue them so long 

 that we could not but think it a rare amusement to 

 listen to them. 



According to Azara the Guira Cuckoo in Paraguay 

 has very friendly relations with the Ani (Crotophaga 

 am)f the birds consorting together in one flock, and 

 even laying their eggs in one nest ; and he affirms 

 that he has seen nests containing eggs of both species. 

 These nests were probably brought to him by his 

 Indian collectors, who were in the habit of deceiving 

 him, and it is more than probable that in this matter 

 they were practising on his creduhty ; though it is 

 certain that birds of different species do sometimes 

 lay in one nest, as I have found — ^the Common Teal 

 and the Tinamu for instance. I also doubt very 

 much that the bird is ever polygamous, as Azara 

 suspected; but it frequently wastes eggs, and its 

 procreant habits are sometimes very irregular and 

 confusing, as the following case will show : 



A flock numbering about sixteen individuals 

 passed the winter in the trees about my home, and 



