YELLOW-BILLED CUCKOO, OR RAIN-CROW. 555 
cock-chaffer # , Carabi , and other kinds of insects, as well 
as various sorts of berries ; but their worst propensity 
is the parasitic habit of sucking the eggs of other birds, 
thus spreading ruin and dismay wherever they approach. 
They ( hatch several broods in a season, and I have 
seen a nest with eggs in it as late as the 28th of August ! 
though they usually take their departure in some part of 
the month of September. Considering the time they are 
engaged in breeding, they raise but few young, appearing 
to be improvident nurses, and bad nest-makers, so that 
a considerable part of their progeny are either never 
hatched, or perish soon after ; a fortunate balance to check 
the increase of their numbers, and circumscribe the 
otherwise evil of their existence. They are greatly at- 
tached to places where small birds resort, for the sake 
of sucking their eggs ; and I have found it difficult at 
times to eject them, as when their nests are robbed, 
without much concern, they commence again in the same 
vicinity, but adding caution to their operations, in pro- 
portion to the persecution they meet with ; in this way, 
instead of their exposing the nest in some low bush, I have, 
with difficulty, met with one, at last, in a tall larch more 
than 50 feet from the ground. When wholly routed, the 
male kept up a mournful kow koto kow for several days, 
appearing now sensible by experience of the misery of 
his own predatory practices. 
Careless in providing comfort for their progeny, the 
American Cuckoo, like that of Europe, seems, at times, 
inclined to throw the charge of her offspring on other 
birds. Approaching to this habit, I have found an 
egg of the Cuckoo in the nest of a Cat-Bird ; yet, though 
the habitation had been usurped, the intruder prob- 
ably intended to hatch her own eggs. At another time, 
* Melolontha lanigera . 
