AN ODD FRIENDSHIP.
[To THE EDITOR Or THE " SPECTATOR,"] SIR,—For very many years, successive generations of a family of robins in our garden have been in the habit of coming to the pantry window for food throughout the year. There is always one bird, perhaps the parent pro tern., which is specially tame. About a fortnight ago a young cuckoo, neaxly full- grown and previously unseen or unnoticed, flew against a window and was picked up slightly stunned, but otherwise uninjured. Having apparently quite recovered in a day or two it was set at liberty, but has since remained in and about the garden. To-day it perched on a rose-tree close to the house whilst the robin to which I have referred flew to and fro, carrying bits of bread with which it fed the cuckoo in the most amusing way. The robin appeared to be enjoying a game of play, sometimes bringing food but frequently pretending to do so and flying off as though highly amused and delighted at the cuckoo'S evident disappointment. All the time the cuckoo showed every sign of interest and excitement, watching the robin's move- ments with intense eagerness; whenever the robin approached the window where the food stood, the cuckoo would throw back its head and open an expectant beak almost wide enough to swallow the robin itself, into which occasionally as aforesaid the latter would pop a morsel in the neatest and daintiest way imaginable. The cuckoo is not crippled in the least, and flies off swiftly at sight or sound of an intruder, returning at intervals with or without the robin. The cuckoo may possibly have been hatched in the robin's nest, but I prefer to indulge in the belief that it hurt its beak or was to some extent inValided by the accident referred to, and so enlisted the sympathy and active support of its intelligent little friend the robin.—I am, Sir, &c., J. M. PaniToss..
Boughton Hall, Send, Surrey, July 22nd.
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