WIMBLEDON COMMON. 
103 
skimming along the hedgerows, often pursued by an angry flock 
of small birds, who either mistake it for a hawk, or have an 
intuitive instinct that its visit betokens no good to their off- 
spring. There are vastly more females than males : of course 
they do not pair, or we should have the usual programme of nest 
building and rearing of the young. One hears his voice along 
the whole country side, and as this is the season of courtship it 
is more full and sonorous than in any other month. The cuckoo 
is one of the shyest of birds, and though he is heard everywhere 
he is but seldom seen ; and yet he is not a frequenter of thick 
bushes, but takes boldly to large trees. The female is less con- 
spicuous than the male, for she has no betraying call and is less 
often in the open. 
It is now a recognised fact that the hen cuckoo, having 
deposited her egg on the ground, carries it in her bill and de- 
posits it in a nest which has probably been already selected. In 
no other way could the egg have been placed by the bird in some 
of the situations in which it has been found. It is a mistake to 
suppose that the hedge sparrow, or indeed any species, is 
particularly selected for the doubtful honour of being foster 
parents to the young cuckoo. The garden warbler, nightingale, 
blackcap, whitethroat, robin, red start, wagtail, pipit, yellow 
hammer, chiff-chaff, greenfinch, linnet, spotted flycatcher, and 
several other species have at times been chosen for the 
imposition. 
We have now left the gorse, and cross a wide open tract 
covered with heather, which by-and-by will be gorgeous with 
its pretty pink blooms. Again come small hills and dales, and 
then we arrive at a wood mostly oak and birch, with rides cut 
through it. The oaks are yet bare, but the birches with their 
silver stems and delicate drooping branches, just tinged with 
bright green, look like a lovely emerald fountain. There is a 
continuous twittering and chirping of birds intent on family 
cares : how glad the trees must be on awakening to renewed life 
to hear the birds once more! In places there is a thick under- 
growth of brambles and hazels and occasionally a few clumps of 
holly : it is a famous spot for nightingales. Here they sing all 
day and all night, and as old Izaak Walton says, “ they breathe 
such sweet loud musick out of their little instrumental throats, 
that it might make mankind to think that miracles had not 
ceased.” 
This wood lacks one great charm, it has no great variety of 
wild flowers. The wild h)^acinth flourishes, and occasionally 
you come upon a large patch that “ makes the earth look like 
the sky,” but primroses are scarce, and so is the wood anemone. 
Ask most people which comes first, the full harvest of the 
primrose or the full harvest of the wood anemone. They 
doubtless will be ready with a confident answer, one giving 
priority to the first, another to the second. They will both be 
wrong, there is no telling: all depends how Nature orders her 
