INDIAN CUCKOOS 
N the matter of cuckoos India can give points to 
the British Isles. The good folk at home see 
only one species of cuckoo, and that spends less 
than half its time on the British shores; we in 
India, on the other hand, can boast of an avifauna 
in which the sub-family cuculine is represented by no 
fewer than thirty species. 
Lest the above statement should excite the righteous 
indignation of British ornithologists, let me hasten to 
say that it is not strictly true, that it requires a little 
modification. 
Species of cuckoo, other than the common or garden 
Cuculus canorus, have been seen in England outside 
the Zoological Gardens. Three bold species have, at 
divers times, visited the shores of Albion, and warm 
was the reception each received. 
Thanatology is a science carried to perfection in the 
Homeland. So-called naturalists shoot, at sight, every 
strange bird. In 1871 an American Black-Billed 
Cuckoo was seen at Belfast and shot. On five different 
occasions the Yellow-Billed Cuckoo—the American 
Rain-bird—has visited our shores only to be put to 
death. A similar fate overtook the two Great Spotted 
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