98 
NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
what species are suitable and congenerous nursing-mothers for its dis- 
regarded eggs and young, and may deposit them only under their care, 
this would be adding wonder to wonder, and instancing, in a fresh 
manner, that the methods of Providence are not subjected to any mode 
or rule, but astonish us in new lights, and in various and changeable 
appearances.* 
What was said by a very ancient and sublime writer concerning the 
defect of natural aiFection in the ostrich, may be well applied to the 
bird we are talking of : 
" She is hardened against her young ones, as though they were not 
hers : 
Because God hath deprived her of wisdom, neither hath he imparted 
to her understanding." + \ fr^f " 
Query. Does each female cuckoo lay but one egg in a season, or 
does she drop several in different nests according as opportunity offers 
I am, &c. 
LETTEE V. 
TO THE SAME. 
Selborne, April 12th, 1770. 
Dear Sir, — I heard many birds of several species sing last year after 
Midsummer; enough to prove that the summer solstice is not the 
period that puts a stop to the music of the woods. The yellowhammer 
no doubt persists with more steadiness than any other; but the 
woodlark, the wren, the redbreast, the swallow, the white-throat, the 
goldfinch, the common linnet, are all undoubted instances of the truth 
of what I advanced. 
If this severe season does not interrupt the regularity of the summer 
migrations, the blackcap will be here in two or three days. I wish it 
was in my power to procure you one of those songsters ; but I am no 
birdcatcher ; and so little used to birds in a cage, that I fear if I had 
one it would soon die for want of skill in feeding. 
Was your reed-sparrow, which you kept in a cage, the thick-billed 
* We do not know exactly the instinctive motive which influences the cnckoo in 
the deposition of its eggs. Locahty in this may have its influence, and the cuckoos 
frequenting a woodland and cultivated district, may seek other fostermothers from 
those which visit a more open country. Upon the edges of cultivated grounds, 
bordering on a subalpine district where there is natural copse-wood ; and there is 
no locality more in favour with the cuckoo ; the nest of the titlark, Anthus pratensis, 
is that most frequently selected : that of the ring dove, as quoted above, is a most 
unlikely resort to be chosen : an unerring instinct guides the parent ; the dissimi- 
larity of the egg would have been at once discovered, and the important fact of 
the intruder requiring to be the strongest, and to keep the nest for himself would 
in this case most probably be reversed. We have known the egg of the cuckoo to 
be deposited in the nest of the chaflinch, to which Mr. White's objection will not 
stand, for he had overlooked the fact that all the finches, and some others, which 
are commonly called "hard-billed birds," feed their young upon insects, cater- 
pillars, &c. ; and during summer are themselves most useful to the gardener to 
keep in check many of his most troublesome enemies. — See also White's remarks 
the cuckoo. Letter VII. to Barrington, p. 103. j Job xxxix, 16, 17. 
