umerous class of readers who
take an interest in subjects of natural history, I consider it my duty
to communicate first to you, what appears to me a new fact in the
habits and character of that general favourite the cuckoo.

"An egg of this bird was brought to me on the 6th instant, which had
been taken from the nest of the yellow bunting, at a short distance from
this town, and the boy who got the egg gave the following account,
which, I think, may be relied on. When bird-nesting the previous
Saturday, he found a nest of the gold spink (a local name for the yellow
bunting) with the young birds just hatched. On visiting the nest the
following day, he flushed the old bird, having seen her sitting on it,
but the young birds were all excluded, and were lying dead near; and to
his surprise, a single egg--the one he brought to me--occupied the place
of the callow brood. He took away the egg (which is now in my
possession) so that it is impossible to corroborate the statement in any
degree. The above circumstance was first named to me by Tom Green, a
well-known character and naturalist in this town, whom I have always
found to be accurate in his observations on birds, and by him I was
referred to the boy. On my objecting to Green that the accident appeared
incredible, because unnatural, and contrary to strong parental instinct,
he replied, "Ay, sir, but little birds are mightily ta'en up with a
cuckoo; they'll awmost dee out for them;" and he related the following
fact which came under his own observation. When out with his gun,
collecting birds to stuff, (animal-preserving being one of his many
trades), he shot at and wounded a cuckoo, which, after flying some
distance, fell upon a hedge with its wings outstretched: the attendant
bird, which in this case was one of the pipits, continued in the flight
of its patron after the shot, and when Green approached, he found it
sitting on the body of the dead cuckoo.[235]

"It has been supposed by some, that small birds follow the cuckoo for
the sake of annoyance, mistaking it for a sparrow-hawk, to give public
notice of a pirate abroad, and to warn all peaceful subjects of the air
against a common danger. But this is clearly not so, for the flight and
cries clearly distinguish the feelings in the two cases. The attendance
on the cuckoo is at a distance, silent and respectful; but in the other
we have a sort of hue and cry raised, as it were, against a felon, and
which is kept up fr