CUCKOO. 
119 
Family — CucuHdcs. 
Genus — Cuculus. 
116. Cticulus canorus. Cuckoo. 
" To left and right 
The cuckoo told his name to all the hills." 
Tennysoiis " Gardener's Daughter^^ 
" Then be the time to steal adown the vale, 
And listen to the vagrant cuckoo's tale." 
Nattiralisfs Summer Evening WalkP 
A summer visitor to all parts of the county and Isle of 
Wight. 
The bird appears to be fairly evenly distributed through- 
out all our districts. It arrives about the middle of April, 
the old birds leaving in August and the young about a 
month later. 
We do not as a rule pay much attention to reported 
arrivals of the cuckoo in March, but there appears to be no 
room for doubt that a flight reached the south coast during 
that month in the year 1894, when no less than six were 
reported from Sussex, one from Liphook, in this county, 
and others from Surrey and Kent.^ 
White says that the usual time of appearance is " the 
middle of April," the earliest date of the calendar being 
April 7th ; the New Forest people say it is let out at 
Beaulieu Fair (April 15th). 
An observer on the Warner Light Vessel reports one 
flying from N.E. to S.W. on May 12th, 1902, and another 
going in the same direction on the 17th of the same month. 
Mr. Percy Stone wrote to the " West Surrey Gazette " 
^ -'Field." 1902. 
