THE KING-FISHER. 459 
overhanging the water, or a stone projecting above the surface, 
for its prey: in this position it will sometimes remain for hours, 
absolutely immovable. When a fish comes within reach, with great 
rapidity the King-fisher darts upon it, seizing it in its powerful man- 
dibles, and after destroying it by compression, or by knocking it against 
a stone or the trunk of a tree, swallows it head foremost. When fish are 
scarce it feeds upon aquatic insects, which it seizes on the wing. Its 
aérial movements are rapid and direct, but weakly maintained, being 
performed by a series of quick jerking beats of the wings, close to 
the surface of the water: the action of the wings is so rapid as to be 
scarcely perceptible. The King-fisher is a bad walker, on account 
of the shortness of its tarsi. 
This genus are all solitary in their habits, living generally in secluded 
places, and rarely seen even with birds of their own species, except 
in the pairing season. Like the Todies, they build their nests in 
the stéep banks of rivers, either in the natural crevices, or in holes 
hollowed out by water-rats; and these dwelling-places are generally 
littered by the fragments of their food. Father and mother sit 
alternately, and when the young are hatched they feed them with 
the produce of their fishing. The bird has a shrill and piercing note, 
which it utters on the wing. Their flesh is very disagreeable. 
The King-fisher is the Halcyon of the ancients, who attributed to 
it after death the power of indicating the winds. The seven days 
before and the seven days after the winter solstice were the Halcyon 
days, during which the sea remained perfectly calm that the bird 
might build its nest. ‘To its dead body the attributes of turn- 
ing aside thunderbolts, of giving beauty, peace, and plenty, and 
other absurdities, were ascribed. Fiven now, in some remote 
provinces in France, the dead birds are invested with the power 
of preserving woollen stuffs from the attack of the moth; hence 
they are called Moth Birds by drapers and shopkeepers. They are 
inhabitants of almost every region of the globe, and comprehend 
a great number of species, spread over Asia, Africa, and America.* 
Europe possesses one species not larger than a sparrow, and which 
is remarkable for the rich colouring of its feathers. What, 
indeed, can surpass the brilliancy of the King-fisher as it suddenly 
darts along some murmuring brook, tracing a thread of azure and 
emerald? Some authors separate the King-fishers, properly so called 
* In China a great number of species are to be found, all robed in the most 
brilliant plumage, nine of which I have collected. In America I have not been 
so successful, its best-known species being about the size of a Blue Jay, and is so 
like that bird as sometimes to be taken for it by the most experienced. —Eb. 
