CUCKOOS' EGGS.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR-"J Sts,—Can any of your readers verify the statement contained in the following quotation taken from Mystic Immanence, p. 12, by the late Archbishop Basil Wilberforce?
"Recently I was at Christchurch in Hampshire and was con- ducted by Mr. Hart over his unique museum of birds, repre- senting the life work of an expert and enthusiast. Among many
most interesting things ho told me the following It is well known that the cuckoo makes no nest of its own, but places its egg in the nest of one of the smaller birds. Now, in order to deceive the bird amongst whose eggs the cuckoo intends to place its own egg, the cuckoo causes the egg it is about to lay io assume the colour and markings of the eggs of the small bird who is to be the foster-mother.' Mr. Hart showed me over forty cuckoos' eggs, each one coloured to imitate the natural
gg of the bird whose nest the cuckoo had commandeered. This had been done with extraordinary accuracy, from the bright blue of the hedge sparrow's egg to the dull olive of the nightingale's egg, and even the peculiar markings, like notes of music, of the yellow hammer's egg, had been imitated."
[Our correspondent should read The Story of a Cuckoo's Egg, fiy Miss Hilda Terras (Swarthmore Press). He will see from the photographs as well as from the text that the cuckoo's egg was and remained totally unlike those of the hedge-sparrow which in this case was the foster-mother.—ED. Spectator.]
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