Many letters similar to the foregoing passed between those great naturalists and good men, until the muchlamented death of Mr. Hunter closed their correspondence in 1793. Many years previously to Mr. Hunter's death he wrote to his friend Jenner, requesting him to direct his attention to the natural history of the cuckoo. This request was most willingly complied with by the latter, not only because it was made by his quondam master and great friend, but it was also quite in accordance with his own taste as an indefatigable ornithologist. Jenner soon commenced his inquiries and investigations into the natural history of the cuckoo, by enlisting in the cause as many friends and trustworthy agents as he could procure, and after the lapse of some years he forwarded the following interesting communication to Mr. Hunter as the result of his labours. "Dear Sir, "Having at your request, employed some of my leisure hours in attending to the natural history of the cuckoo, I beg leave to lay before you the result of my observations, with a hope that they may tend to illustrate a subject hitherto not sufficiently investigated; and should what is here offered prove, in your opinion, deserving the attention of the Royal Society, you will do me the honour of presenting it to that learned body. "The first appearance of the cuckoo in Gloucestershire, (the part of England where these observations were made,) is about the 17th of April. The song of the male, which is well known, soon proclaims its arrival. The song of the female (if the peculiar notes of which it is composed may be so called) is widely different, and has been so little attended to, that I believe few are acquainted with it. I know not how to convey to you a proper idea of it by comparison with the notes of other birds; but the cry of the dab-chick bears the nearest resemblance to it. "Unlike the generality of birds, cuckoos do not pair. When the female appears she is often attended by two or three males. From the time of her appearance, till after the middle of summer, the nests of the birds selected to receive her eggs are to be found in great abundance; but like other migrating, she does not begin to lay till some weeks after her arrival. I never could procure an egg until after the middle of May, although probably, an earlycoming cuckoo may produce one sooner. "The cuckoo makes choice of the nests of a great variety of small birds. I have known its eggs to be entrusted to the care of the hedge-sparrow, the water-wagtail, titlark, the yellow-hammer, the green linnet, and the whirchat. Amongst these it generally selects the three former, but shows much greater partiality to the hedge-sparrow than to any of the rest; therefore, for avoiding confusion, this bird only will be considered, in the following account, as the foster-parent to the cuckoo, except in instances which are particularly specified. "The hedge-sparrow commonly takes up four or five days in laying her eggs. During this time (generally after she has laid one or two) the cuckoo continues to deposit her egg among the rest, leaving the future care of it entirely to the hedge-sparrow. This intrusion often occasions some discomfiture; for the old hedge-sparrow, whilst she is sitting, not unfrequently throws out some of her own eggs, and sometimes injures them in such a way that they become addle; so that it more frequently happens that only two or three hedge-sparrows' eggs are hatched with the cuckoo's than otherwise; but she sits the same length of time as if no foreign egg had been introduced; the cuckoo's egg requiring no longer incubation than her own. However, I have never seen an instance where the hedge-sparrow has ever thrown out or injured the egg of the cuckoo. "When the hedge-sparrow has sat her usual time, and disengaged the young cuckoo and some of her own offspring from the shell, her own young ones, and any of her eggs that remained unhatched are soon turned out, the young cuckoo remaining possessor of the nest, and sole object of her future care. The young birds are not previously killed, nor are the eggs demolished, bat all are left to perish together, either entangled about the bush which contains the nest, or lying on the ground under it. "The early fate of the young hedge-sparrows is a cir cumstance that has been noticed by others, but attributed to wrong causes. A variety of conjectures have been formed upon it: some have supposed the parent cuckoo the author of their destruction, while others, as erroneously have pronounced them smothered by the disproportionate size of their fellow nestling. Now, the cuckoo's egg being not much larger than the hedge sparrow's (as I shall more fully point out hereafter,) it necessarily follows that at first there can be no great difference in the size of the birds just burst from the shell. Of the fallacy of the former assertion also, I was some years ago convinced by having found that many cuckoos were hatched in the nests of other birds after the old had disappeared; and by seeing the same fate then attend the nestling sparrows as during the appearance of the old cuckoo in this country. But before I proceed to the facts relating to the death of the young sparrows, it will be proper to lay before you some examples of the incubation of the egg, and the rearing of the young cuckoo, since the well-known fact has been controverted by an author who has lately written on this subject; † and since it is a fact so much out of the ordinary course of nature, it may still probably be disbelieved by others. "EXAMPLE I.-The titlark is frequently selected by the cuckoo to take charge of its young one; but as it is a bird less familiar than many I have mentioned, its nest is not so often discovered. I have, nevertheless, had several cuckoo's eggs brought to me that were found in titlark's nests, and had one opportunity of seeing the young cuckoo in the nest of this bird. I saw the old birds feed it repeatedly, and to satisfy myself that they were really titlarks, shot them both and found them to be so. "EXAMPLE II.-A cuckoo laid her egg in a water-wagtail's nest in the thatch of an old cottage. The wagtail sat the usual time, and then hatched all the eggs but one; which, with all the young ones, except the cuckoo, was turned out of the nest. The young birds, consisting of five, were found upon a rafter that projected under the thatch, and with them was the egg not the least injured. On examining the egg, I found the young wagtail it contained quite perfect, and just in such a state as birds are when ready to be disengaged from the shell. The cuckoo was reared by the wagtails till it was nearly capable of flying, when it was killed by an accident. "EXAMPLE III.-A hedgesparrow built her nest in a hawthorn bush in a timber-yard. After she had laid two eggs a cuckoo dropped in a third. The sparrow continued laying as if nothing had happened, and then sat. June 20th, 1786. On inspecting the nest I found that the bird had hatched this morning, and that everything but the young cuckoo was thrown out under the nest. found one of the young hedgesparrows dead, and one egg by the side of the nest entangled with the coarse woody The young cuckoo is generally hatched first. materials that formed its outside covering. On examining the egg, I found one end of the shell a little cracked, and could see that the sparrow it contained was yet alive. It was then restored to the nest, but in a few minutes it was thrown out. The egg being again suspended by the outside of the nest, was saved from breaking. To see what would happen if the cuckoo was removed, I took out the cuckoo, and placed the egg containing the hedgesparrow in the nest in its stead. The old birds, during this time, flew about the spot, showing signs of great anxiety; but when I withdrew they quickly came to the nest again. On looking into it in a quarter of an hour afterwards, I found the young one completely hatched, warm, and lively. The hedgesparrows were suffered to remain undisturbed with their new charge for three hours (during which time they I paid every attention to it) when the cuckoo was again put into the nest. The old sparrows had been so much disturbed by those intrusions, that for some time they showed an unwillingness to come to it; however, at length, they came, and on examining the nest again in a few minutes, I found the young sparrow was tumbled out. It was a second time restored, but again shared the same fate. 3 From these experiments, and supposing, from the feeble appearance of the young cuckoo just disengaged from the shell, that it was utterly incapable of displacing either the egg or young sparrows, I was induced to believe that the old sparrows were the only agents engaged in this seeming unnatural business; but I afterwards clearly perceived the cause of this strange phenomenon, by discovering the young cuckoo in the act of displacing its fellow-nestlings, as the following relation will fully evince: "June 18th, 1787. I examined the nest of the hedgesparrow, which then contained a cuckoo's and three hedgesparrow's eggs. On inspecting the day following, I found the bird had hatched, but that the nest now contained only a young cuckoo and one young hedgesparrow. The nest was placed so near the extremity of the hedge, that I could see distinctly what was going on in it; and to my astonishment, saw the young cuckoo, though so newly hatched, in the act of turning out the young hedgesparrow. "The mode of accomplishing this was very curious. The little animal, with the assistance of its wings, contrived to get the bird upon its back, and making a lodgment for the burden by elevating its elbows, clambered backward with it up the side of the nest till it reached the top, where, resting for a moment, it threw off its load with a jerk, and quite disengaged it from the nest. It remained in this situa tion a short time, feeling about with the extremities of its wings, as if to be convinced whether the business was properly executed, and then dropped into the nest again. With these (the extremities of its wings) I have often seen it examine, as it were an egg and nestling, before it began its ope. rations, and the nice sensibility which these parts appeared to possess seemed sufficiently to compensate for the want of sight, of which, as yet, it was destitute. I afterwards put in an egg, and this, by a similar process, was conveyed to the edge of the nest, and thrown out. These experiments I have since repeated several times, in different nests, and have always found the young cuckoo disposed to act in the same manner. In climbing up the nest, it sometimes drops its burden, and thus is foiled in its endeavours; but after a little respite, the work is resumed, and goes on almost incessantly till it is effected. It is wonderful to see the extraordinary exertions of the young cuckoo when it is two or three days old. If a bird be put into the nest with it, that is too weighty for it to lift out, in this state it seems ever restless and uneasy. But this disposition for turning out its companions begins to decline from the time it is two or three till it is about twelve days old, when, as far as I have hitherto seen, it ceases. Indeed, the disposition for throwing out the egg appears to cease a few days sooner; for I have frequently seen the young cuckoo, after it had been hatched nine or ten days, remove a nestling that had been placed in the nest with it, when it suffered an egg, put there at the same time, to remain unmolested. The singularity of its shape is well adapted to these purposes; for, different from other newly-hatched birds, its back, from the scapula (shoulder blades) downwards, is very broad, with a considerable depression in the middle. This depression seems formed by nature for the design of giving a more secure lodgment to the egg of the hedge-sparrow, or its young one, when the young cuckoo is employed in removing either of them from the nest. When it is about twelve days old this cavity is quite filled up, and then the back assumes the shape of nestling birds in general. "Having found that the old hedge sparrow commonly throws out some of her own eggs, after the nest has received the cuckoo's, and not knowing how she might dispose of her young, if the young cuckoo was deprived of the power of dispossessing them of the nest, I made the following experiment: "July 9th. A young cuckoo that had been hatched by a hedge-sparrow about four hours, was confined in the nest in such a manner that it could not possibly turn out the young hedge-sparrows which were hatched at the same time, though it was almost incessantly making attempts to effect it. The consequence was, the old birds fed the whole alike, and appeared in every respect to pay the same attention to their own young as to the young cuckoo, until the 13th, when the nest was unfortunately plundered. "The smallness of the cuckoo's, in proportion to the size of the bird, is a circumstance that hitherto, I believe, has escaped the notice of the ornithologist. So great is the disproportion, that in general it is smaller than that of a house-sparrow; whereas the difference in the size of the birds is nearly as five to one! I have used the term 'in general,' because eggs produced at different times, by the same bird, will vary very much in size. I have found a cuckoo's egg so light that it weighed only forty-three grains, and so heavy that it weighed fifty-five grains. The colour of the cuckoo's egg is extremely variable; some, both in ground and pencilling, very much resemble the house-sparrow's; some are indistinctly covered with bran-coloured spots; and others are marked with streaks of black, re sembling in some measure the eggs of the yellow-hammer. "The circumstance of the young cuckoo being destined by nature to throw out the young hedge-sparrow, seems to account for the parent cuckoo's dropping her egg in the nests of birds so small as those I have particularised. If she were to do this in the nest of a bird which produced a large egg, and consequently a large nestling, the young cuckoo would, probably, find insurmountable difficulty in solely possessing the nest, as its exertions would be unequal to the labour of turning out the young birds. Besides, though many of the larger birds might have fed the nestling cuckoo very properly, had it been committed to their charge, yet they could not have their own young to be sacrificed for the accommodation of the cuckoo, in such great numbers as the smaller ones, which are so much more abundant; for, though it would be a vain attempt to calculate the numbers of the nestlings destroyed by the cuckoo, yet the slightest observation would be sufficient to convince us that they must be very large. "Hence it may be remarked that, though nature permits the young cuckoo to make this great waste, yet the animals thus destroyed are not thrown away or rendered useless. At the season when this happens, great numbers of quadru peds and reptiles are seeking provision; and if they find the callow nestlings which have fallen victims to the young cuckoo, they are furnished with food well adapted to their peculiar state. "It appears a little extraordinary that two cuckoos' eggs should even be deposited in the same nest, as the young one produced from one of them must inevitably perish; yet I have known two instances of this kind, one of which I shall relate : "June 27th, 1787. Two cuckoos and a hedge-sparrow were hatched in the same nest this morning; one hedge sparrow's egg remained unhatched. In a few hours after a contest began between the two cuckoos for the possession of the nest, which continued undetermined till the next afternoon when one of them, somewhat superior in size, turned out the other, together with the young hedge-sparrow and the unhatched egg. This contest was very remarkable: the combatants alternately appeared to have the advantage, each carried the other several times nearly to the top of the nest, and then sank down again, oppressed by the weight of its burden; till at length, after various efforts, the strongest prevailed, and was afterwards brought up (reared) by the hedge-sparrow. "I now come to consider the principal matter that has agitated the mind of the naturalist respecting the cuckoo, VIZ. :- Why, like other birds, it should not build a nest, incubate its eggs, and rear its young? There is, certainly, no reason to be assigned, from the formation of this bird, why, in common with others, it should not perform all these several offices, for it is in every respect perfectly formed for collecting materials and building a nest; neither its external shape nor internal structure prevent it from incubation; nor is it by any means incapacitated from bringing food for its young. It would be useless to enumerate the various opinions of authors on this subject, from Aristotle to the present time. Those of the ancients appear to be either visionary or erroneous; and the attempts of the moderns towards its investigation have been confined within very narrow limits; for they have gone but little further in their researches than to examine the constitution and structure of the bird, and having found it possessed of a capacious stomach, with a thin external covering, concluded that the pressure upon this part, in a sitting posture, prevented incubation. They have not considered that many of the birds which incubate have stomachs analogous to those of the cuckoo's. The stomach of the owl, for example, is proportionally capacious, and is almost as thinly covered with external integuments. Nor have they considered that the stomachs of the nestlings are always much distended with food; and that this very part, during the whole time of their confinement to the nest, supports, in a great degree, the weight of the whole body; whereas, in a sitting bird, it is not nearly so much pressed upon; for the breast, in that case, fills up chiefly the cavity of the nest; for which purpose, from its natural convexity, it is admirably well fitted. "These observations, I presume, may be sufficient to shew that the cuckoo is not rendered incapable of sitting through a peculiarity either in the formation or situation in the stomach. To what cause, then, may we attribute the singularities of the cuckoo? May they not be owing to the following circumstances? The short residence this bird is allowed to make in the country where it is destined to propagate its species, and the call that nature has upon it, during that short residence, to produce a numerous progeny. "The cuckoo's first appearance here (Gloucestershire) is about the middle of April, commonly on the 17th. Its egg is not ready for incubation for some weeks after its arrival, seldom before the middle of May. A fortnight is taken up by the sitting bird in hatching the egg. The young bird generally continues three weeks in the nest before it flies, and the foster-parents feed it more than five weeks after this period; so that, if a cuckoo should be ready with an egg much sooner than the time pointed out, not a single nestling, even one of the earliest, would be fit to provide for itself before its parent would be instinctively directed to seek a new residence, and be thus compelled to abandon its young one; for the old cuckoos take their final leave of this country the first week in July. "Had nature allowed the cuckoo to have staid here as long as some other migratory birds, which produce a single set of young ones, (as the swift and nightingale, for example,) and had allowed her to have reared as large a number as any bird is capable of bringing up at one time, these might not be sufficient to have answered her purpose; but by sending the cuckoo from one nest to another, she is re duced to the same state as the bird whose nest we daily rob of an egg, in which case the stimulus for incubation is suspended. The cuckoo, not being subject to the common interruptions, goes on laying from the time she begins till the eve of her departure from this country; for, although the old cuckoos, in general, take their leave the first week in July, yet I have known an instance of an egg being hatched in the nest of a hedge-sparrow so late as the 15th Among the many peculiarities of the young cuckoo, there is one that shows itself very early. Long before it leaves the nest, it frequently, when irritated, assumes the manner of a bird of prey, looks furious, throws itself back, and pecks at anything presented to it with great vehemence, at the same time making a chuckling noise like a young hawk. Sometimes, when disturbed in a smaller degree, it makes a kind of hissing noise, accompanied with a heaving motion of the whole body. The growth of the cuckoo is uncom monly rapid. The chirp is plaintive, like that of the hedgesparrow; but the sound is not acquired from the foster parent, as it is the same whether it be reared by the hedgesparrow or any other bird. It never acquires the adult note during its stay in this country. There seems to be no precise time fixed for the departure of the young cuckoos; I believe they go off in succession, probably as soon as they are capable of taking care of themselves; for, although they stay here till they become nearly equal in plumage and size to the old cuckoo, yet in this very state the fostering care of the hedge-sparrow is not withheld from them. have frequently seen the young cuckoo of such a size that the hedge sparrow was perched on its back or half-expanded wing, in order to gain sufficient elevation to put the food into its mouth. At this advanced age, I believe young cuckoos procure some food for themselves, like the young rook, for instance, which in part feeds itself, and is partly fed by the old ones, till the approach of the pairing season. If they did not go off in succession, it is probable we should see them in great numbers by the middle of August, as they are to be found in great plenty when in a nestling state, they must now appear very numerous, since all of them must have quit the nest before this time. But this is not the case; for they are not more numerous at any season than they are in the months of May and June. "The same instinctive impulse which directs the cuckoo to deposit her eggs in the nests of other birds, directs her young one to throw out the eggs and young of the owner of the nest. The scheme of nature would be incomplete without it; for it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for the little birds destined to find succour for the cuckoo to find it also for their own young ones, after a certain period; nor would there be room for the whole to inhabit the nest. "Thus, sir, I have, with much pleasure, complied with your request, and laid before you such observations as I have hitherto been capable of making on the natural history of the cuckoo; and should they throw some light on a subject that has long remained in obscurity, I shall not think that my time has been ill-employed. With a grateful sense of the many obligations I owe to the friendship with which you have so long honoured in a debt of gratitude which never can be repaid, has not as yet been mentioned. It is scarcely necessary to say we mean the prophylactic power of cowpock, by the judicious propagation of which, the human race may be rendered exempt from the invasion of one of the most loathsome, malignant, and fatal diseases known to the medical world: namely, SMALL-POX. A CANADIAN FESTIVAL. BY CAVIARE. ROUND the oak trees, round the oak trees, round the palms and pine trunks hoary, Bearded with the moss of ages, linked in dim cathedral arches, Gather we, as, setting seaward, sinks the sun behind the forests; And the moon, a white-cheeked phantom, walks amid the rosy meadows; As the first star, born of twilight, trembles overhead the cedars, And the marsh fowl, westward flying, fleck the slow decreasing splendour, And the smoke plumes from our log huts, glimmer bluely, upward flowing; ; We are gathered, not in silence, for the hour hath inspiration, We are gathered, not in dolour, though our hearts are brimmed with sorrow, Sorrow for the Past behind us-sorrow for the Future coming; Ruined homes and lonely churchyards; peace and cant and rotting quiet, Banners flaunted, not in battle, but on courtly towers and breezes, Swords flashed forward, not in conflict, but like faggots bound together. Ah! the world forgets its mission; ah! the days are growing coarser, And the clay of common natures mixes with the brighter metal Till the earth is bronzed with meanness; and the watchcries of our fathers Blazon hatchments, blazon tombstones; dumb yet myriad voiced reproaches To the sloth that eats the Present, and the shame that waits the Future. Let us hope within the darkness which doth front our straining vision, Something new is taking birth and struggling bravely to the sunlight; Infant wailings! yet we hear them; baby pleadings! they have potence. And anon shall swell to thunders; when the tender hands grow firmer, Broader in their grasp of finger, stronger in their knitted muscle, Fit to hurl broad bolts and upwards bear the buckler, in whose shadow, Peoples maddened by oppression, and athirst for retribution, Forest-hewers, water-bearers to the God-accursed oppressors, Shall fling down their tools and shackles, and arrayed in triple conscience, Forward, onward, wheresoever Right is bound and Power is rampant, Bear the creed of liberation, and the shafts that smite Resistance. Dimly seaward, where the silence broodeth black across the orient; Kingdom of a million mornings-gates that daily bloom with sunrise, Glorious East; around whose outposts, when the fogs are crimson shafted By the arrows of the daybreak, cocks awaken, clarionthroated; Far away behind the billows, scarfed with vapour, maned with lightning, Far below familiar planets, ever broadening through the twilight Through the sad Canadian sunsets-lies an island sphered in ocean, Scattered o'er with flying sea mist. In her vales the green wheat bloometh Through the curved palms of April, and the blood-red moons of harvest; There, amid the homestead shadows, orchards riot, apples ripen, And the mellow pears wax luscious in the bronzing winds of Autumn. There in lonely woodland places, where the marsh-pool fringed with rushes, Lieth like a lake of quiet, sits the solemn plumed heron. And on uplands, bramble-crested, phantoin-draped, in ash and willow, Gloom the gravestones of our fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, sweethearts. (Christ receive them!) From the nor❜land, where the cliffs spur back the surges, To the south that steeps its headlands in the swathes of the Atlantic, Plenty floweth. Heavens! avenge us! we have wrongs and recollections. At our mother's board we hungered, on our household hearths we trembled, Strangers fattened on our labours, slipped the red-eyed hounds of havoc, And, o'er ruined homes and altars, chased us from the land that bore us. Earth, preserve the bones bequeathed in our sorrow to thy keeping, In thy vast sepulchral silence, treasure their decaying ashes. We have said "farewell" in patience, fixing eyes upon the future. When the tumult that's approaching, though its triumph hour be distant, Should bear witness to our vengeance. Hark! there tolls from out the hemlocks The low chimes of prayer; how often, in the valleys of dear Ireland, When the waggons crossed the corn folds, 'mid the sheaves of yellow barley, Have we heard the silver vesper, breaking through our harvest carols? God be with it, angels watch it-Land of Saints and Bards and Soldiers Cresset in the dark of Europe! garden of the Faith of Ages ! God be with it--God be with it! though our hands delve foreign quarries, Wrenching drops of gold from granite ;-though the crown of man's ambition Glitter on our aspirations, Ireland, we cannot forget thee! Glorious home of storm and darkness, bloom and radiance, truth and beauty, Blessings calm thy mournful present, triumph bless thy dawning future! Thus they sang a group of exiles, in the low Canadian, silence Streamed the river through the forest, with a sad unceasing wailing Wailing like a pining spirit; in the splendour o'er the tree tops Eddied round the dusky eagle; and from bosks and brownleafed jungles Shrilled the pipes of birds: slow lapsing gathered thicker half the twilight, 'Till the grass was aisled in darkness. Then the log fires, piles of odour, Crackled in the crisped clearing, and the smoke-wreaths drifted nor'ward. And the flames in fans leaped upward, lapping tongues of panting crimson, Round the huge boles of the pine trees and the branches of the cedars, Till the foliage, glimmered golden, shaken by the misty sea wind. She ceased, and for sorrowful pauses, around the red ring of the log-fire Dumb was the silence of anguish, whilst she nestled close to her father, And hid her white face on his bosom. Then Owen moved back in the darkness And pressed his brown hands to his eyelids: "Sing for us, Owen !" they clamoured; 'Sing us a song of the mountains; a brave ballad, breathing of heather, And stirred with the pulses of torrents." He, laughing, slung forward his rifle "Then let's have a chorus, my brothers; and here's to the brave iron mountains; Here's to the Galtees-hurrah! men, and long may they flourish defiant!" Up through the dusk of the forest, ascended the cry of the exiles, A cataract arching a darkness, a-roar in the span of its falling. THE MOUNTAINS. My spurs are rusted, my coat is rent, And the thistle down and the barley beard But my rifle's as bright as my sweetheart's eye, What care have I for your king and laws? Click, click your glasses, friends, with mine, |