File:The birds of Australia (16679090119).jpg

PJL.ATB XL VIII.
GENUS CHRYSOCOCCYX. .Gould.)
rpHIS is a widely-distributed genus, embracing the countries of both old and new worlds below the equator.
Members of the family are found in Africa, New Zealand, Java, and Australia. The latter country
possesses three varieties, all of which are parasitic and migratory.
CHRYSOCOCCYX LUCIDUS. .Gould.)
BRONZE or SHINING CUCKOO. Genus: Chrysococcyx.
IT was at one time settled that the Lamprococcyx of New Zealand and New South Wales were distinct species of
the same genus, and to avoid confusion the distinctive term, Plagosus, was given by Gould to the continental
bird. However, Buller has successfully proved that the two birds are identical, for he finds the Shining
Cuckoo (as it is called in New Zealand) migrates there from the shores of the continent for a few months in each
year ; therefore, Zucidus is the most fitting name to bestow upon the species.
The migratory instincts of this bird induce it in summer to wing its way across the ocean to New
Zealand ; in winter it retires to the north, where insect food is more abundant. For it is insectivorous in its habits,
preying principally upon hymenoptera, coleoptera, and caterpillars. Its stomach is capacious, membranous, and
slightly lined with hair. Its movements in searching for food, though remarkably quick, are characterised by
great quietness, the bird leaping from branch to branch in the gentlest way, picking an insect here and there, or
prying for others among the leaves and crevices of the bark with a keen scrutiny which nothing escapes. It has
a quick, undulating flight, which displays to the fullest advantage the bronze green colouring of the male.
The force of hereditary instinct is never more strongly evidenced than when we find it asserting itself in
some immaterial trait that has no effect upon the present, except as a mark of evolution, but clearly points back
to the discarded habits of previous races. Among the Centropi we found the parasitic custom unknown ; each
pair made their own dome-shaped nest, and performed the task of rearing their young like any other virtuous
birds. The Eudynamis cut itself free from all domestic obligations, and left its young to be tended by kindly
Crows, thus proving that there is a wide racial gap between the two genera. That gap we may consider bridged
over in the chain of evolution by the Chrysococcyx; for the Shining Cuckoo, though a true parasite, is usually found
to deposit its egg in a dome-shaped nest having a very small entrance. In New South Wales, the Malurus cyaneus
and the Geobasileus chysorrhous are forced to be foster parents. Mr. Bennett, in writing of the Lncidus, states
that he has found the egg in the nest of Accmthiza chrysorhicea, and that he has seen a nest of this bird with five
eggs, that of the Cuckoo being deposited in the middle of the group, so as to insure its receiving the warmth
imparted by the sitting bird, and thus less likely to be addled. He also narrates the following anecdote : " A
white-shafted Flycatcher .Rhipidura albiscapa) was shot at Ryde, near Sydney, in the act of feeding a solitary
young bird in its nest, which, when examined, was found to be the chick of the Bronze Cuckoo of the colonists.
It was ludicrous to observe this large and apparently well-fed bird, filling up with its corpulent body the entire
nest, receiving daily the sustenance intended for several young Flycatchers."
Not only does the parent Cuckoo shirk all the trouble of hatching its eggs, but the young one is even
more callous in its conduct towards its foster parents, for no sooner is it hatched among a brood than it sets to
work to kill the rightfully-hatched chicks, throwing the dead bodies contemptuously out of the nest; at the