92 
British Birds. 
for its accommodation, while I have known a Wryneck to sit in the lower boughs 
of a poplar tree in my garden and answer the children imitating its call for a 
quarter of an hour together. The note is very peculiar and sounds like the 
syllables ‘ pee-pee-pee ’ often reiterated. 
Like the preceeding birds, the Cuckoos have a zygodactyle 
or scansorial foot, with the toes arranged two in front and 
two behind, but the disposition of the tendons is different 
and resembles that of the Game-birds. They have only ten tail feathers. 
The Cuckoos are the only European representatives of the Order Coccyges , which 
contains a large number of Cuckoo-like birds, as well as the Plantain-eaters 
{Musophagi) of Africa. 
THE CUCKOOS. 
Sub-Order CUCULl. 
THE 
COMMON CUCKOO. 
(Cuculus canorus.) 
In a little sketch of the Birds of Great Britain, such as this 
book alone pretends to be, there is not space to enter at length 
into the history of a species like the Cuckoo, the study of which 
isamongthe most interesting problems of Bird life. In appearance 
the Cuckoo is very like a Sparrow-Hawk, and it has a similar flight, so that when it 
appears in the open, the small birds mob both the Cuckoo and the Hawk in the same 
manner, whether from hatred towards the former on account of its parasitic habits, or 
from fear of the latter as a natural enemy, it is hard to decide. Independently of the 
grey colour of the upper surface and the barred under parts which complete the resem- 
blance between the Cuckoo and the Sparrow-Hawk, there is yet another peculiar feature in 
common between the two, viz. : the lengthened thigh-feathers which are found in both, 
and render the Cuckoo still more remarkably like the Sparrow-Hawk in appearance. 
The female Cuckoo resembles the male, but is a little smaller, and has generally 
some rufous on the chest, and this colour is very conspicuous in life, and generally 
serves to distinguish the hen bird when flying. There is also a curious rufous phase 
of plumage, called the ‘hepatic phase,’ which occurs in both sexes, but is more 
commonly met with on the 
Continent than in the British 
Islands. The young birds 
are quite different from the 
adults, being dark brown or 
blackish, mottled with rufous 
and white, and with a dis- 
tinct white spot at the back 
of the neck. The tail shows 
rufous bars and the under 
surface of the body is buffy 
white, barred across with 
blackish-brown bars. 
The Common Cuckoo. As is well known, the 
