ducklings or sandpipers. There are two young birds and one little
speckled egg just pipped. But how is this? what mystery is here? One
nestling is much larger than the other, monopolizes most of the
nest, and lifts its open mouth far above that of its companion,
though obviously both are of the same age, not more than a day old.
Ah! I see; the old trick of the cow bunting, with a stinging human
significance. Taking the interloper by the nape of the neck, I
deliberately drop it into the water, but not without a pang, as I
see its naked form, convulsed with chills, float downstream. Cruel?
So is Nature cruel. I take one life to save two. In less than two
days this pot-bellied intruder would have caused the death of the
two rightful occupants of the nest; so I step in and turn things
into their proper channel again.

It is a singular freak of nature, this instinct which prompts one
bird to lay its eggs in the nests of others, and thus shirk the
responsibility of rearing its own young. The cow buntings always
resort to this cunning trick; and when one reflects upon their
numbers, it is evident that these little tragedies are quite
frequent. In Europe the parallel case is that of the cuckoo, and
occasionally our own cuckoo imposes upon a robin or a thrush in the
same manner. The cow bunting seems to have no conscience about the
matter, and, so far as I have observed, invariably selects the nest
of a bird smaller than itself. Its egg is usually the first to
hatch; its young overreaches all the rest when food is brought; it
grows with great rapidity, spreads and fills the nest, and the
starved and crowded occupants soon perish, when the parent bird
removes their dead bodies, giving its whole energy and care to the
foster-child.