of anything. He would drive the turkey gobbler and
the rooster. He would advance upon them holding one wing up as high as
possible, as if to strike with it, and shuffle along the ground toward
them, scolding all the while in a harsh voice. I feared at first that
they might kill him, but I soon found that he was able to take care of
himself. I would turn over stones and dig into ant-hills for him, and he
would lick up the ants so fast that a stream of them seemed going
into his mouth unceasingly. I kept him till late in the fall, when he
disappeared, probably going south, and I never saw him again."

My correspondent also sends me some interesting observations about the
cuckoo. He says a large gooseberry bush standing in the border of an old
hedgerow, in the midst of open fields, and not far from his house, was
occupied by a pair of cuckoos for two seasons in succession, and, after
an interval of a year, for two seasons more. This gave him a good chance
to observe them. He says the mother-bird lays a single egg, and sits
upon it a number of days before laying the second, so that he has seen
one young bird nearly grown, a second just hatched, and a whole egg
all in the nest at once. "So far as I have seen, this is the settled
practice,--the young leaving the nest one at a time to the number of six
or eight. The young have quite the look of the young of the dove in many
respects. When nearly grown they are covered with long blue pin-feathers
as long as darning-needles, without a bit of plumage on them. They part
on the back and hang down on each side by their own weight. With its
curious feathers and misshapen body the young bird is anything but
handsome. They never open their mouths when approached, as many young
birds do, but sit perfectly still, hardly moving when touched." He also
notes the unnatural indifference of the mother-bird when her nest and
young are approached. She makes no sound, but sits quietly on a near
branch in apparent perfect unconcern.

These observations, together with the fact that the egg of the cuckoo
is occasionally found in the nests of other birds, raise the inquiry
whether our bird is slowly relapsing into the habit of the European
species, which always foists its egg upon other birds; or whether, on
the other hand, it is not mending its manners in this respect. It has
but little to unlearn or to forget in the one case, but great progress
to make in the other. How far is its rudimentary nest