The cuckoo has been seen to be preyed
on by the hawk; and this never happens between birds of the same
species. They say no one has ever seen the young of the cuckoo. The
bird eggs, but does not build a nest. Sometimes it lays its eggs in
the nest of a smaller bird after first devouring the eggs of this
bird; it lays by preference in the nest of the ringdove, after first
devouring the eggs of the pigeon. (It occasionally lays two, but
usually one.) It lays also in the nest of the hypolais, and the
hypolais hatches and rears the brood. It is about this time that the
bird becomes fat and palatable. (The young of hawks also get palatable
and fat. One species builds a nest in the wilderness and on sheer
and inaccessible cliffs.)
8
With most birds, as has been said of the pigeon, the hatching is
carried on by the male and the female in turns: with some birds,
however, the male only sits long enough to allow the female to provide
herself with food. In the goose tribe the female alone incubates,
and after once sitting on the eggs she continues brooding until they
are hatched.
The nests of all marsh-birds are built in districts fenny and well
supplied with grass; consequently, the mother-bird while sitting quiet
on her eggs can provide herself with food without having to submit
to absolute fasting.
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