' INTRODUCTION. 
xlvii 
individual, has bestowed on them a proportional fecundity; and their 
prolificacy, in a great degree, counteracts their danger. The poultry tribes, 
and the Woodpeckers, Creepers, Coots, water, and land Rails, deposit more 
than the usual number laid by birds of the Crow, Hawk, and most of the 
Sparrow kinds. The Eagle, the Owl, and the Pigeon, in general, deposit 
but two eggs : the Guillemots, the Razor-bill, and the Puffin, rarely more 
than one ; sometimes the eggs prove effete and barren ; and at others far 
inferior to the common size.®^ Of all land birds that incubate in Devon, the 
egg of the Snipe, in comparison with its body, is the largest ; and that of the 
Cuckoo,"** the smallest : the former being superior in size to the egg of the 
Magpie, and the latter inferior to that of the Skylark. The eggs of birds, 
in general, do not bear proportion to the bulk of those which lay them : 
that of the Kite is considerably larger than the egg of the Raven ; and that 
of the Guillemot is superior to the egg of the Turkey : the common 
Gulfs exceeds, in size, the egg of the Fowl ; and the eggs of the Razor bill, 
and the Fulmar, are longer and larger than those of the Pheasant. The 
most oval are presumed to contain males, and the round, and more obtuse 
ones, females : this is not a modern opinion. “ Fseminam edunt quas 
rotundiora gignuntur, reliqua marem ” says Pliny While the female is 
in the act of incubation, she is the most perfect pattern of patience and perse- 
verance. The urgent calls of hunger remain long unsatisfied, and the appear- 
ance of danger ceases to intimidate. The Chaffinch, the Greenfinch, the 
Robin, and the red-backed Shrike, the Blackcap, and the Linnet, the 
Nuthatch, the Sand Martin and the Titmice, will often suffer themselves to 
be taken, rather than quit their eggs, and will continue, when undisturbed, 
I have found eggs of the Blackbird, Redbreast, and Hedge Sparrow, very far inferior in bulk 
to their common size. 
Some writer on Ornithology avers, that the egg of the Cuckoo is of the size of that of the 
Thrush; he evidently could never have seen it. 
35 
Ova parire solet genus pennis condecoratum non animas. Ennius. 
