470 SCANSOBES, OR CLIMBEES. 



been carefully studied, and to which what we haye to say regarding 

 this group of birds applies. Grey Cuckoos are essentially migratory. 

 They pass the warm season in Europe, and the winter in Africa 

 or in the warm parts of Asia. They arrive in France in the 

 month of April, and leave it at the end of August or the begin- 

 ning of September. They travel during the night, not in numerous 

 bands, but alone, or in groups of two or three at the most. They 

 prefer bushy parts of woods, but often traverse the country in 

 search of nourishment, which is composed principally of insects 

 and caterpillars. They are frightfully voracious, which accounts 

 for the enormous capacity of their stomachs. Of a surly and 

 t3'rannical nature, thej' suffer no rival of their species in the 

 neighbourhood which they have chosen ; for if some intruder 

 arrives, it is hunted out without truce or mercy. On account 

 of this unsociable disposition, the Grey Cuckoos, when captured 

 after attaining maturity, are unable to accommodate themselves 

 to confinement — in short, adults starve themselves to death when 

 in captivity. Young birds are less restive, and gradually accus- 

 tom themselves to a cage ; but they are always disagreeable 

 on account of their quarrelsome habits, which prevents them 

 from living caged with feathered companions. 



Cuckoos are celebrated for the j^eculiar manner in which 

 they raise their progeny. The females do not build a nest or 

 cover their eggs, neither do they take care of their young. They lay 

 their eggs in the nests of other birds, generally in those of little in- 

 sectivorous Passerines, such as the Lark, the Eobin, Hedge Sparrow, 

 Redthroat, Nightingale, Thrush, Blackbird, and sometimes also in 

 those of the Magpie, Turtle Dove, and ^Vood Pigeon. They leave 

 the care of hatching their eggs to these strangers, and of feeding 

 their young until the}' are completely developed. Different expla- 

 nations have been proposed to justify the anomaly which seems to 

 make a hard-hearted mother of the Cuckoo. We owe to M. Floreuf- 

 PreA'ost the possession of certain information on this point which 

 had long remained in obscurity. According to this naturalist. 

 Cuckoos are polygamous, but in a reverse sense to other birds. 

 Whilst among them males have scA'eral females, with Cuckoos it 

 is the females that have several males, because the stronger sex is 

 much mure numerous than the weaker. These ladies have no 



