THE HALCYON, OR KINGFISHER 61 



accompanied when on the wing even by its mate, and 

 then only at a long interval. As soon as its young 

 are fledged, it drives them off to the fortune of alien 

 regions, and resents the intrusion of strangers of its 

 own kind into resorts with which it has become 

 familiar, and over which it has established a posses- 

 sor's claim. It has a note, but seldom utters it a Its note. 



IGO thin piping cry of tee-tee-tee and only when flying. 

 Its feet are small and feeble ; and, once seated on its 

 perch the bough of a tree that loves the water, or 

 even (to the astonishment of the patient angler) a 

 projecting fishing-rod it is inclined to remain, mo- 

 tionless but vigilant, for a long period, never changing 

 its position by turning or hopping, like (say) a restless- 

 hedge-sparrow. It is on the whole a sedentary bird, 

 but extremely active when in motion. It lives on fish Its food. 

 and water-insects, and must devour an enormous 



170 quantity of small fry in a season. It plunges from 

 a low perch, or even, after a short hovering like a 

 hawk, direct from the air, into the pool where it spies 

 a prey, disappears from sight, and emerges nearly 

 always with its victim in its powerful beak. It stuns 

 or strikes it dead on a tree-bough, and swallows it 

 entire. Like the owl, it disgorges what is indigestible. 

 Its nest has nothing romantic either in its appearance Nest and 

 or in its environment. It is scarcely a nest, but is 

 remarkable as being made of disgorged bones and 



i3o shells, and is invariably in a hole, from two to three 

 feet deep, and sloping upwards into the interior of 

 a bank. The eggs, six to eight in number, are small 



oo * o * > 



glossy white, with a faint pinky opalescent suffusion 

 until blown. A young kingfisher is known, when 

 fully fledged, from an old one only by its dusky black 



