Life- History of the Cuckoo. 



119 



hry, and charge of unnatural unfeeling conduct often preferred 

 igainst the Cuckoo, 1 as if she did not follow out the instincts of 

 Jier nature as truly as every other bird ; and as if there was not 

 uome good and sufficient reason, (though we may be unable to 

 athom it) why some species delegate the care of their young to 

 other birds : rather, I think, should we admire the wonderful 

 ..nstinct which leads them to select, as foster parents, those species 

 bnly whose feeding is similar to their own, and so would provide 

 their young with suitable nourishment ; and that dexterity which 

 enables them to insert their eggs amongst others, just at the right 

 :moment when the foster parent is preparing to sit. 2 



Now, first I beg to state without hesitation that never, by any 

 possibility does our British Cuckoo, either build a nest of her own, 

 ior incubate her eggs on the ground. We hear constant tales of 

 such occurrences : every year our periodicals and newspapers con- 

 tain statements of such marvellous incidents, which would be 

 marvellous indeed if true : but I venture to assert most positively, 

 without fear of contradiction, that all such stories have originated 

 from some error : and either the common Night-jar, 3 of nearly the 

 same size, fluttering away from her marbled eggs at the root of 

 an old oak, or some other bird has been mistaken for the Cuckoo, 

 which never, in any single instance, has been known to sit on her 

 own eggs. 



The Cuckoo then, houseless and vagabond though she is, and the 

 veritable " gipsy of the feathered tribes," as she has been styled, soon 

 after her arrival here in the spring, begins to busy herself no less 

 than other birds, in making preparations for her future progeny : 

 but instead of preparing a nest as other birds do, her occupation is 

 to scour the hedgerows and plantations, and watch the busy nest- 

 makers with more eager eye than any schoolboy ; 4 observing day 

 by day the progress made, and anxiously selecting those which 



1 Bishop Stanley's Familiar History of Birds, vol. ii., p. 80. 



2 Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne, letter iv. 



2 Montagu's Supplement to Ornithological Dictionary, vol. ii. Rennie's 

 Architecture of Birds, p. 380. G. White's Selborne, letter vii. 



4 llennie's Architecture of Birds, p. 374. 



