FURRED AND FEATHERED YOUNGSTERS. 33 



low, for instance, which a water-vole has scratched, 

 just to keep his little nails in proper order, in the 

 almost perpendicular bank of a small dyke that 

 acts as feeder to a watercress-bed, is very frequently 

 finished up by the pipit as a nesting site. Now, it 

 would be impossible for the hen-cuckoo to lay in 

 a nest of that kind, but she can shuffle down and 

 drop the egg into it from her mouth. 



The life of a naturalist — if it were prolonged for 

 him well beyond the allotted time of threescore years 

 and ten, and all his faculties preserved, until at last 

 the golden bowl is broken and the light dies out — is 

 only long enough to learn a little of what we shall 

 know more about hereafter; and, by the way, the 

 life -odour of fresh earth and the aromatic scent 

 from waving trees will keep a man young for a long 

 time. 



In case our readers might fall in with a young 

 cuckoo in the conditions above described, let me 

 give a minute description of what it looks like when 

 it is feathered but not yet able to fly. At first sight 

 it is very like a young hawk. The bill is dusky, and 

 not so much hooked as that of the old bird; the 

 margins of the gape, or mandibles, are yellow, the 



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