OF SELBORNE. 



215 



When birds come to suffer by severe 

 frost, I find that the first that fail and die 

 are the redwing-fieldfares, and then the 

 song-thrushes. 



You wonder, with good reason, that the 

 hedge-sparrows, &c. can be induced at all 

 to sit on the egg of the cuckoo without 

 being scandalized at the vast dispropor- 

 tioned size of the supposititious egg : but 

 the brute creation, I suppose, have very 

 little idea of size, colour, or number. For 

 the common hen, I know, when the fury 

 of incubation is on her, will sit on a single 

 shapeless stone instead of a nest full of 

 eggs that have been withdrawn; and, 

 moreover, a hen-turkey, in the same cir- 

 cumstances, would sit on in the empty nest 

 till she perished with hunger. 



I think the matter might easily be deter- 

 mined whether a cuckoo lays one or two 

 eggs, or more, in a season, by opening a 

 female during the laying-time. If more 

 than one was come down out of the ovary, 

 and advanced to a good size, doubtless 



