" The Cornhill Magazine." 49 



cases, both of blackbirds and pigeons, it has been found 

 that the eggs of the blackbird or pigeon had been 

 punctured or cracked by mandibles to prevent hatch- 

 ing, that so the young cuckoo might not run the risk 

 of such an equal contest. This shows still further 

 forecast and ingenuity on the part of the parent 

 cuckoos, if we are right in inferring, as we are surely 

 forced to do, that the parent cuckoos were here the 

 malefactors ; and also may be taken to prove that the 

 cuckoos in certain ways do in so far look after the 

 welfare and safety of their progeny. Darwin tells us 

 that the Molothrus bonariensis (American cowbird) 

 has the most extraordinary habit of pecking holes in 

 the eggs, whether of their own species or of their 

 foster-parents, which they find in the appropriated 

 nests,* and to this we shall refer again with evidence 

 from first-hand reporters. 



V. 



A WRITER on " British Birds : their Nests and Eggs," 

 in the Cornhill Magazine, says : — 



" It was once thought that the cuckoo paired, but 

 it is now known that the species is polygamous.!- The 

 number of hens that constitute a harem is not known, 

 but from the number of bachelor birds the males 

 must greatly predominate over the females. The 

 egg of the cuckoo has been found in the nests of sixty 

 different species, several of which are exceedingly 



* Origin of Species, p. 215, 6th edition. 



t Not polygamous, surely, but polyandrous, and instead of 

 harem, with a number of hens, the question must be how many 

 cocks attend one hen ? 



