KINGFISHER. 319 



portion on which the eggs had been first seen. On 

 weighing these bones, thns freed from all foreign 

 particles, I found they amounted to exactly 1,080 grains 

 or two ounces and a-quarter and thirty grains. Mr. Gould 

 (Birds of Great Britain), in describing a kingfisher's 

 nest, taken by himself from a bank on the Thames, 

 (April 18th, 1859,) speaks of the deposit of bones then 

 found "as weighing 700 grains, which had been cast 

 up and deposited by the bird and its mate in the short 

 space of twenty-one days," as he had previously ab- 

 stracted four eggs, placed on a very slight layer of the 

 same material. How long in my case the nest had been 

 forming I cannot say, but the eggs were hard set upon 

 when I took them, and though I beheve nearly all the 

 older portions of the structure either crumbled to bits, 

 or were washed away imder the cleansing process, there 

 still remained, in all probability, more then one year's 

 deposit. The quantity of small fry whose tmy skeletons 

 alone would weigh 1080 grains, might form a problem 

 for the ingenious, and undoubtedly would amount to 

 something enormous ; yet anyone who has watched the 

 voracity of the young, when kept in confinement, will 

 scarcely be surprised at the mass of pellets thus ejected 

 by adult birds in then' breeding places. 



I have recently met with a description of three nests, 

 by a true naturahst, in that most interesting work, 

 entitled ^^ Life in Normandy ;"^ one found at Eton, one 

 in Northamptonshire, and one in Italy.f The first 



* "Life in Normandy, sketclies of French fishing, farming, 

 cooking, natural history, and politics, drawn from nature," 

 2 vols., 8vo., 1863. 



f All three nests varied somewhat in character, that at Eton 

 much resembled the one at Keswick, being described as " nearly 

 circular, having only one side open ; the top, bottom, and sides all 

 composed of the same substance ; the inside covered with some of 

 the light sandy soil which surrounded it, and which adhered to 



