THIRD SEASON (1920): RECORD 87 
usual thing for Cuckoos to have one or more 
breaks in their laying sequence, but at the time I 
had become so accustomed to the regular laying of 
Cuckoo A that I could scarcely credit a lapse — and 
that for a regular laying interval — in her activities. 
The Laying of the Eighteenth Egg , June 18. 
In the morning we observed No. 8 pair of 
Meadow Pipits — restarted on the 13th inst. — 
behaving suspiciously as though they had built a 
new nest. We examined nests i 5 and 6 4 which 
contained five and three eggs respectively, and at 
noon saw the Cuckoo, which appeared to be watching 
Tree Pipits on the extreme south-west corner of 
the common. There was a Tree Pipit’s nest 
there, the new nest of the pair she had used for her 
fifteenth egg, but it was ignored by the Cuckoo. 
Thence she flew to the centre orchard. 
At 1 p.m. I saw her quietly watching No. 6 
pair of Meadow Pipits from the cherry tree B, in 
the centre orchard. I purposely frightened her 
away and lunched within twenty yards of nest 6 4 , 
as I thought it more desirable that she should use 
nest i 5 to-day, since it contained its full comple- 
ment of eggs and, owing to its location, was more 
liable to accident. 
