56 On the Ornithology of Wilts \Cuculidce\ 



garden : and yet every body does not know the appearance of the 

 bird, so much resembling the Kestrel or Sparrow-hawk at first 

 sight ; the dark lead-coloured plumage above, the light under parts 

 barred with brown, and the full dark yellow eye, all contributing 

 to the general resemblance ; but when we come to look nearer, we 

 are soon undeceived, for the beak is small, soft, slender, and nearly 

 straight, like those of other insectivorous birds, and the feet are 

 small and weak, with two toes before and two behind, after the 

 manner of other climbing birds, and not at all like the strong 

 hooked beak and powerful talons of the birds of prey : here the 

 Cuckoos are unusually abundant, and remarkably tame, and one or 

 more may frequently be seen every spring sitting on the iron 

 railings in my garden, while their oft repeated cry, as they answer 

 one another in different keys from opposite plantations, is almost 

 continually to be heard, more especially towards evening, when 

 (like many other birds) they become more clamorous than during 

 the day. When they have been here some time, their call becomes 

 changed to a wild stammering repetition of the first syllable, 

 though an individual which returns here every spring invariably 

 utters this peculiar call from its first arrival, and with a pertinacity 

 and in so loud a key as to attract the notice of every stranger. 1 

 The singular habit of the Cuckoo of never building its own nest, 

 but depositing its eggs singly in those of other birds, insectivorous 

 species being always selected for the foster parents, is well known : 

 why the Cuckoos adopt this peculiar and almost unnatural habit ; 

 how they deposit their eggs in the nests of little birds ; when the 



1 There is a favorite old country rhyme which marks with sufficient accuracy 

 the arrival, song, change of note, and departure of the bird, 



"In April 

 Come he will : 

 In May, 



He sings all day. 

 In June 



He alters his tune, 

 In July 



He prepares to fly ; 

 In August 

 Go he must. 



