128 Darwin and Romanes dealt with. 



thrown out of the nest. This point will recur in a 

 later section. Another difficulty. These young birds 

 that are still to come out of eggs yet unhatched a few 

 days before the 28th of July, most distinctly cannot 

 enjoy the long period of five or six weeks feeding by 

 the foster parent, after they fly, because that would 

 carry them far beyond their date of migration — 

 middle of September : that is, allowing ten days for 

 brooding, twenty in nest before flying, and between 

 five and six weeks for being fed after they are able 

 to fly. Two months and a half would bring them, 

 at the latest, into the middle of October. Either, 

 then, they migrate at the proper time — middle of 

 September, at latest — or they do not migrate at all, 

 and remain all the winter in this country — which is it ? 



Dr. Bowdler Sharpe makes this record about the 

 American cuckoos : 



" There seems to be even with this well-behaved 

 parent (! !) the same difference in time between the 

 deposition of the eggs as is to be found in the case of 

 Cucidus canorus. Audubon relates that he found a 

 nest in which were five young cuckoos and two eggs. 

 Two of the young birds were sufficiently advanced 

 to scramble out of the nest, and the other three were 

 of different ages — one being just hatched, another 

 several days old, and the third still further advanced, 

 covered with " pen " feathers, so that it would have 

 been able to fly in about a week. His friend, Mr. 

 Rhett, in whose garden the nest was found, assured 

 him that he had known as many as eleven young 

 cuckoos to be reared in a nest in the course of one 

 season." 



Mr. Blyth gives, fortunately, a longer account of 



