Cherry Trees and the Cuckoo

The cherry tree is strangely mixed up with the cuckoo in many cuckoo stories, because of the tradition that the cuckoo must eat three good meals of cherries before be is allowed to cease singing.

Good bird, prithee, tell to me

How many years I am to see.”

The answer is made by the cuckoo repeating its cry the prophetic number of times.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.