CHAP. XVIII.] 



BIRDS. 



315 



FAMILY 67. ALCEDINID^. (19 Genera, 12^-fepecies.) 



GENERAL DISTRIBUTION. 



1.2.3.4 1.2.3.4 I 1.2.3.4 i 1.2.3.4! 1.2.3.4J1.2.3.4 



The Kingfishers are distributed universally, but very un- 

 equally, over the globe, and in this respect present some of the 

 most curious anomalies to be found among birds. They have 

 their metropolis in the eastern half of the Malay Archipelago 

 (our first Australian sub-region), from Celebes to New Guinea, in 

 which district no less than 13 out of the 1 9 genera occur, 8 of them 

 being peculiar ; and it is probable that in no other equally varied 

 group of universal distribution, is so large a proportion of the 

 generic forms ^confined to so limited a district. From this centre 

 kingfishers decrease rapidly in every direction. In Australia 

 itself there are only 4 genera with 13 species ; the whole Oriental 

 region has only 6 genera, 1 being peculiar ; the Ethiopian also 

 6 genera, but 3 peculiar ; and each of these have less than half 

 the number of species possessed by the Australian region. The 

 Palaearctic region possesses only 3 genera, all derived from the 

 Oriental region ; but the most extraordinary deficiency is shown 

 by the usually rich Neotropical region, which possesses but a 

 single genus, common to the larger part of the Eastern Hemi- 

 sphere, and the same genus is alone found in the Nearctic region, 

 the only difference being that the former possesses eight, while 

 the latter has but a single species. These facts almost inevitably 

 lead to the conclusion that America long existed without king- 

 fishers ; and that in comparatively recent times (perhaps during 

 the Miocene or Pliocene period), a species of the Old World 

 genus, Ceryle, found its way into North America, and spreading 

 rapidly southward along the great river-valleys has become 

 differentiated in South America into the few closely allied forms 

 that alone inhabit that vast country the richest in the world in 



