Origin of Species Variorum

be inconveniently long, more especially as she .. migrates at a very early period; and the first hatched young would probably have to be fed by the male alone. But the American cuckoo is in this predicament; for she makes her own nest, and has eggs and young successively hatched, all at the same time. It has been asserted that the American cuckoo occasionally lays her eggs in other birds' nests; but I hear on the high authority of Dr. Brewer, that this is a mistake. ↑ Nevertheless, I could give several instances of various birds which have been known occasionally to lay their eggs in other bird's nests. Now let us suppose that the ancient progenitor of our European cuckoo had the habits of the American cuckoo; but that occasionally she laid an egg in another bird's nest. If the old bird profited by this occasional habit through being enabled to migrate earlier or through any other cause; or if the young were made more vigorous by advantage being taken of the mistaken .. instinct of another species, than by their own mother's care, encumbered as she could hardly fail to be by having eggs and young of different ages at the same time, and by having to migrate at an early period; then the old birds or the fostered young would gain an advantage. And analogy would lead me to believe, that the young thus reared would be apt to follow by inheritance the occasional and aberrant habit of their mother, and in their turn would be apt to lay their eggs in other birds' nests, and thus be more successful in rearing their young. By a continued process of this nature, I believe that the strange instinct of our cuckoo could be, and has been, generated. I may add that, according to Dr. Gray and some other observers, the European cuckoo has not utterly lost all maternal love and care for her own offspring.