THE KINGFISHER. 269 



Halcyon, as any other skilful artisan would, puts together 

 on land first the framework, and then the supplementary 

 portion of its nest, the materials being shelly matter and 

 spines, whence derived is unknown ; though some main- 

 tain that the principal substance employed is fishbones. 

 During the progress of the work the careful bird several 

 times tests its buoyancy by actual experiment, and when 

 satisfied that all is safe, launches its future nursery on 

 the ocean. However turbulent might have been the con- 

 dition of the water previously to this event, thenceforth a 

 calm ensued, which lasted during the period of incubation ; 

 and these were " Halcyon days " {Halcyonides dies), which 

 set in seven days before the winter solstice, and lasted as 

 many days after. What became of the young after the 

 lapse of this period is not stated, but the deserted nest 

 itself, called halcyoneum, identical, perhaps, with what we 

 consider the shell of the echinus, or sea-urchin, was deemed 

 a valuable medicine.* 



The real nest of the Kingfisher is a collection of small 

 fish-bones, which have evidently been disgorged by the 

 old birds. A portion of one which I have in my posses- 

 sion, and which was taken about twenty years since from 

 a deep hole in an embankment at Deepdale, Norfolk, con- 

 sists exclusively of small fish-bones and scraps of the 

 shells of shrimps. A precisely similar one is preserved in 

 the British Museum, which is well worthy the inspection 

 of the curious. It was found by Mr. Gould in a hole three 

 feet deep on the banks of the Thames ; it v/as half an inch 

 tliick and about the size of a tea saucer, and weighed 700 

 grains, Mr. Gould was enabled to prove that this mass 

 was deposited, as well as eight eggs laid, in the short 

 space of twenty-one days. lu neither case was there any 

 attempt made by the bird to employ the bones as materials 

 for a structure ; they were simply spread on the soil in 

 such a way as to protect the eggs from damp, possessing 



* Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. x. cap 32. xxxii. cap. 8. 



