Cuckows indeed have been not unfrequently shot as they
were carrying a Cuckow’s egg, presumably their own, in
their bill*—^a fact which has probably given rise to the belief
that they suck the eggs of other birds. The testimony in
favour of this belief proves on examination to be very weak, f
but it has doubtless been fostered by imperfect observation
of circumstances the true explanation of which seems to
have been first supplied by the late Mr. Rowley. This
gentleman, who for a while made the Cuckow his particular
study and had much experience of its habits, declared (Ibis,
1865, p. 186) as one of the results of his investigations that
the hen Cuckow seldom succeeds in introducing her egg
into another bird’s nest without the act being resented, and
consequently without using more or less violence and engaging
in a scuffle, of which traces often remain. It would
therefore appear that we may justifiably suppose that the
Cuckow ordinarily, when inserting her egg, excites the fury
(already stimulated by her Hawk-like aspect) of the owners
of the nest by breaking, turning out of it, or even carrying
off from it one or some of the eggs that may have been
already laid therein, and this induces the dupe to brood all
the more eagerly what is left to her. As to the assertion
that the Cuckow herself takes any further interest in the
fate of the egg she has foisted upon her dupe, or in the
future welfare of its product, there is really no evidence
* The earliest instance of this in Britain seems to be that observed by Kinahan
and Prof. Haughton as reported by Thompson (B. Irel. iii. p. 442). Another
was soon after recorded by Mr. Harper (Zool. p. 3145) who saw a Cuckow flying
with something between its mandibles. He followed and reached within twenty
yards of it as it crawled like a Parrot by the side of a drain in a meadow. Then
it stopped and he shot it, when he found the substance he had noticed in its bill
to be its egg. Le Yaillant, however, seems to have been the first to discover this
interesting fact, not indeed in our own species, but in the South-African Coucou
Didric ”—the Lamprococcyx cuprens or Clialcites aureus of authors a bird of
like parasitic habits, two females of which he says (Ois. d Afrique, v. pp. 47," 48)
were shot by himself and his Hottentot Klaas, as they were carrying one of their
eggs in their bill.
f Hoy, it is true, says (Mag. N. H. v. p. 278) that he detected a Cuckow
flying away from a Wagtail’s nest with one of that bird s eggs in its bill, after
having left an egg of its own in exchange for the one taken. Other ornithologists
bave given-similar evidence, but there is nothing to prove that the Cuckow
meant to swallow its spoil.
worth attention, though some men of high scientific rank
bave asserted that such is the case. It is enough to remark
that none of them have been sufficiently accustomed to outdoor
observation to inspire confidence in their own experience,
or to be competent judges of that of others. Most of them
relied on statements, made no doubt in good faith, but made
without the accurate practice so necessary for a field-naturalist.*
An old Cuckow may very likely in the pursuit of her
business be now and then seen near a nest containing a
young Cuckow; but that the latter was her own offspring, or
that she was intentionally visiting it, are assumptions which
cannot be allowed without stronger evidence than has been
in most cases adduced.
The egg of the Cuckow—of which more must be said
presently—having been successfully placed in the nest of
her dupe,f it will be convenient to describe the subsequent
* Stories of this kind seem to have been first put forth in England in 1772 by
Barrington (Phil. Trans, lxii. p. 299, note) whose example was unfortunately
followed by Erasmus Darwin (Zoonomia, ed. 1794, i. pp. 172, 173, and ed.
1796, i. pp. 175-177) and Fleming (Brit. Anim. pp. 90, 91). In 1823, and
again about five years later, Mr. Blackwall (Mem. Lit. Philos. Soc. Manchester,
ser. 2, iv. pp. 464, 465, and Zool. Journ. iv. pp. 297-300), reversing the
experience of White (in his seventh letter to Barrington), gave what is no
doubt the correct explanation of the more prominent cases reported by those
authors, namely that the birds seen were Nightjars. But notwithstanding
this, John Edward Gray subsequently revived the belief by relating, it is said
(Proc. Zool. Soc. 1836, p. 104), “ a series of facts,” to the effect that the hen
Cuckow sometimes takes care of her young, feeds it after leaving the nest in
which it was hatched, and teaches it to fly. The details of this naturalist’s
observations, which were “ made by himself,” as stated by Mr. Gould, in
1836 or 1837, (B. Eur. pt. xix.), seem never to have been published, and
the only other information about them is that given by Blyth who said
(Analyst, ix. pp. 67, 68) that Gray “ affirms that he has himself seen a
Cuckoo, day after day, visit the spot where one of its offspring was being reared,
and which it finally enticed away from its foster-parents.” There is therefore no
means of accounting for the mistake, but that a mistake was made scarcely any
one ..can doubt. In 1859 even, a celebrated ornithologist tried to persuade the
Editor and some of his friends that the naked breast and belly of a Cuckow
was full proof of the bird having been brooding. The nudity of these parts,
figured by Prof. Schlegel, in 1831, in illustration of his often-quoted and little-
read prize-essay (Natuurk. Yerhandel. Haarlem, xix. pp. 237-268, fig. 1), is
characteristic of both sexes of the Cuckow, and the example in question proved
on dissection to be a male !
t Of the birds included in this work the egg of the Cuckow is recorded as