158 



COW BUNTING. 



" batioii had commenced, and on the seventh day from the disco- 

 " very I found a young Cow-bird that had been hatched during my 

 " absence of twenty-four hours, all the eggs of the proprietor re- 

 " maining. I had not an opportunity of visiting the nest for three 

 " days, and on my return there was only one egg remaining, and 

 " that rotten. The Yellow-throat attended the young interloper 

 " with the same apparent care and affection as if it had been its 

 " own offspring. 



" The next year my first discovery was in a Blue-bird's nest 

 " built in an hollow stump. The nest contained six eggs, and the 

 " process of incubation was going on. Three or four days after 

 " my first visit I found a young Cow-bird, and three eggs remain- 

 " ing. I took the eggs out ; two contained young birds apparently 

 " come to their full time, and the other was rotten. I found one 

 " of the other eggs on the ground at the foot of the stump, differing 

 " in no respect from those in the nest, no signs of life being dis- 

 ^' coverable in either. 



" Soon after this I found a Goldfinch's nest with one egg of 

 " each only, and I attended it carefully till the usual complement 



of the owner were laid. Being obliged to leave home, I could 

 " not ascertain precisely when the process of incubation com- 

 " menced; but from my reckoning, I think the egg of the Cow- 



bird must have been hatched in nine or ten days from the com^ 

 " mencement of incubation. On my return I found the young Cow- 

 " bird occupying nearly the whole nest, and the foster mother as 



attentive to it as she could have been to her own. I ought to 

 " acknowledge here, that in none of these instances could I ascer- 

 " tain exactly the time required to hatch the Cow-bird's eggs ; and 

 " that of course none of them are decisive; but is it not strange 

 " that the egg of the intruder should be so uniformly the first 



hatched ? The idea of the egg being larger, and therefore from 

 " its own gravity finding the center of the nest, is not sufficient to 



explain the phenomenon; for in this situation the other eggs 



