Life-history of the Cuckoo. 



125 



Finches and Buntings : these exceptions being doubtless in cases 

 only where the Cuckoo was deprived, by some accident, of the nest 

 she had selected for her egg, and which when ready to be laid, she 

 was obliged to consign to the care of the best nurse she could find 

 at short notice. To this seeming inconsistency on the part of the 

 parent bird, I may however add, that grain-eating species have 

 been known to bring up young Cuckoos ; and the explanation is, 

 that even the hard-billed birds are accustomed to feed their young, 

 at any rate at first, with insects. 



From the thirty-seven species alluded to above, which have been 

 ascertained to act as foster parents of the young Cuckoo, Dr. 

 Baldamus enumerates no less than twenty-eight, to whose several 

 eggs he affirms the Cuckoo will assimilate her egg in colouring ; 

 and this he then proceeds to prove from the specimens lying before 

 him, and which (as I before remarked) are all carefully authenti- 

 cated, in regard to the nests from which they were taken : all these 

 specimens he examines singly, and describes their colouring, as 

 nearly all partaking, in a greater or less degree, of the character, 

 ground colour, and markings of the eggs of the species in whose 

 nests they were severally laid : while some are so extremely similar 

 that but for the grain 1 or texture of the shell and certain charac- 

 teristic specks, it would be difficult to distinguish them apart. The 

 exceptions to this general rule, are those laid in the nests of corn- 

 eating species, and our author adds, that it would be extraordinary 

 indeed, if the Cuckoo's eggs should resemble the eggs of these 

 exceptional and never intended foster parents. 



" The fact then " (says Dr. Baldamus) " is quite established and 



beyond all doubt, that there are Cuckoo's eggs, which both in 



colour and in marking, are very like the eggs of those species in 



whose nests they' are generally laid :" and then he proceeds to 



argue that Nature, who never trifles, nor acts without purpose, has 



plainly given the parent Cuckoo this faculty, in order to facilitate 



1 " Das Korn-" the German word exactly answering to our English idiom 

 (l grain." The grain or texture of the shell is too often overlooked by Oologist's, 

 but amongst the very similar eggs of some species, as more particularly among 

 the Duck tribe, this is one very important means of identification, more es- 

 pecially when the egg is placed under a low magnifying power. 



