CUCKOOS. 
inasmuch as the toe connot he brought more than half- 
forward, although it can he placed entirely back- 
ward. The Cuckoos, in fact, are half-perching, half- 
climbing birds, not only in their feet, but in their 
manners.* 
Cuckoos are never found in other than warm and 
temperate climates. Two species only are known to 
resort to Europe, and these never show themselves in 
our quarter of the globe, except in the warm season. 
Tropical countries and those which approach the 
equator afford the greatest number of species. 
The food of the Cuckoos consists principally of soft 
fruits and soft insects, especially the latter, and more 
particularly when they are in the larva state. Most of 
the species are migratory, and the more typical species 
fly with strength and rapidity. 
Although the common European Cuckoo {Caculus 
canorus) is so generally known from its singular song, 
and parasitic habit, as it is termed, of depositing its 
egg in the nest of another bird, and thereby imposing 
upon another species the duty and labour of hatching 
and rearing its offspring, we must enter into some 
detail concerning it, more particularly since some 
points of its economy are strangely different to the 
habits of most birds, others have been little noticed, 
and many still remain to be explained. 
The form of the nostrils in the typical Cuckoo is 
very peculiar, and it is the opinion of Mr. Swainson 
that future observation will show this structure to be 
intimately connected with their parasitic habits. The 
nests of those species in which the Cuckoo deposits 
* Magazine of Zoology and Botany. 
