A Peculiar Point. 73 



IX. 



Here a very peculiar point arises regarding the 

 migration of the young cuckoos from this country. 

 Mr. Muirhead, in his Birds of Berwickshire, a truly 

 good and beautiful book, says : 



" It is not likely that the young instinctively know 

 the route to be taken on migration, any more than a 

 young, untrained homing pigeon knows the direction 

 in which to fly to reach its cote, when it is conveyed 

 a long distance away from its native haunt." * 



And yet, in face of this, we know that the elder 

 cuckoos quit this country in large numbers in the 

 end of July, and certainly go in the earlier part of 

 August, consistently with the old rhyme : 



" July, he may fly : 

 August, go he must." 



Mr. Muirhead himself, at another place, says that 

 young cuckoos are common in Scotland till the end 

 of August, and some have in different seasons been 

 found there in the beginning of September. They 

 certainly migrated, but the question is, if Mr. Muir- 

 head is right, how ? — if they had no intuitive notion 

 of the route — how ? The old ones had all long gone, 

 and, if no intuitive notion of route — once again — how ? 



The following paragraph appeared in the Daily 

 Chronicle, of Sep. 6th, 1898 : 



" The Cuckoo in September. — The Rev. Selwyn 

 C. Freer, High Ercall Vicarage, Wellington, Salop, 

 writes, under date Sept. i : — ' It may interest some 

 of your readers to know that a cuckoo was seen by 



* i, p. 326. 



