58 OBSERVATIONS ON THE CUCKOO. 
can unite my testimony with that of others, though, 
in a few instances, our opinions do not entirely coin- 
cide. 
Dr. Jenner states that Cuckoos continue to lay 
regularly from the exclusion of the first egg to the 
time of their departure, and supposes that they are 
enabled to do so by intrusting the care of their pro- 
geny to strangers, being placed by this circumstance, 
he observes, in a similar situation to the bird whose 
nest is daily robbed of an egg. Nowif Dr. Jenner 
means to assert that birds, during the breeding- 
season, can produce eggs at will, and that they may 
be excited to lay in succession many more than their 
usual number, by daily removing one from their 
nests, he is certamly mistaken: Colonel Montagu’s 
experiments*, as well as my own, decidedly prove 
the contrary, both with regard to wild and domestic 
birds. 
As Cuckoos deposit only a single egg in the same 
nest, they have been thought, by most persons, to lay 
no more than one. Dr. Jenner, on the contrary, 
supposes, from an examination of the ovary in a bird 
which had just commenced laying, and from having 
observed that Cuckoos’ eggs are occasionally laid 
about the time that the old birds disappear, that they 
produce a large number. With due deference to such 
high authority as Dr. Jenner, I think there are suffi- 
* «Ornithological Dictionary,’ Introduction, p. 10 and follow- 
ing. 
