THE BRITISH NATURALIST. 



[July 



cuckoo has been regarded as of good omen, and, more than a hundred 

 years before Chaucer was born, our ancestors sang: 



Sumer is icumen in, 



Lhude sing cuccu ; 

 Groweth sed and bloweth med, 



And springeth the wde nu. 



Sing cuccu. 



Awe bleteth after lombe, 



Lhouth after calve cu ; 

 Bulluc sterteth, bucke verteth ; 



Murie sing cuccu, 



Cuccu, cuccu. 



Wei singes thu, cuccu ; 

 Ne swik thu naver nu. 



The joyousness of this song, now near 700 years old, will be shared by 

 every healthy mind, when April brings back from Africa this noisy 

 traveller, the herald of the new life that is bursting forth in leaf and 

 flower, in the songs of birds and in the hum of bees. 



Many and varied are the superstitions that have clustered round the 

 cuckoo, the most immoral vagrant of the feathered tribe. The belief 

 that in winter it was transformed into a sparrow-hawk has been very 

 widely held, and probably arose from its general resemblance to 

 one, both in shape, plumage, and flight. That it is really widely- 

 separated from any of the hawk tribe it is perhaps scarcely necessary 

 to point out ; it is mainly a feeder on insects, and is unconsciously 

 of immense service to man as a devourer of caterpillars. Whether the 

 hairy caterpillars, which form a large part of its diet, irritate its stomach 

 and so cause those manifestations of ill-nature, which are also exhibited 

 by higher organisms when suffering from indigestion, or whether the 

 greediness and ill-nature are due to some deeper cause, is perhaps 

 doubtful. 



Though caterpillars are the staple, they are not the exclusive food of 

 the cuckoo ; it occasionally takes a few berries by way of dessert. It 

 will eat small beetles and spiders, and sometimes hawks at dragon-flies, 

 whose strong and rapid flight cannot always save them from a foe not 

 less greedy and cruel, and much more powerful than themselves. 



According to an old belief, on first hearing the cuckoo in spring, one 

 should promptly turn over such money as he has in his pockets, and 

 thus ensure great increase of wealth before the year is out. Those 

 persons who on first hearing the cuckoo have no money in their pockets 

 are not unreasonably regarded as very unfortunate. 



The cuckoo is included with the bats in the curious list of unclean 

 birds (!) given in Leviticus xi. and Deuteronomy xiv. ; there is, how- 



