238 



HISTORY OF BIRDS. 



Its nest, or rather hole, is very different 

 from that described by the ancients, by whom 

 it is said to be made in the shape of a long, 

 necked gourd of the bones of the sea-needle. 

 The bones, indeed, are found there in great 

 quantities, as well as the scales of fishes ; bat 

 these are the remains of the bird's food, and 

 by no means brought there for the purposes 

 of warmth or convenience. The king-fisher, 

 as Bellonius says, feeds upon fish, but is in- 

 capable of digesting the bones and scales, 

 which he throws up again, as eagles and owls 

 are seen to do a part of their prey. These 

 fill the bird's nest of course; and although they 

 seem as if designedly placed there, are only 

 a kind of nuisance. 



In these holes, which, from the remains of 

 fish brought there, are very foetid, the king- 

 fisher is often found with from five eggs to 

 nine. There the female continues to hatch, 

 even though disturbed ; and though the nest 

 be robbed, she will again return and lay there. 

 " I have had one of those females brought 

 me," says Reaumur, " which was taken from 

 her nest about three leagues from my house. 

 After admiring the beauty of her colours, I 

 let her fly again, when the fond creature was 

 instantly seen to return back to the nest where 

 she had just before been made a captive. 

 There, joining the male, she again began to 

 lay, though it was for the third time, and 

 though the season was very far advanced. At 

 each time she had seven eggs. The older the 

 nest is, the greater quantity of fish-bones and 

 scales does it contain: these are disposed with- 

 out any order ; and sometimes take up a good 

 deal of room." 



The female begins to lay early in the sea- 

 Aristotle, tells us that at the end of the hole there is a kind 

 of bedding formed of the bones of small fish and some other 

 substances, evidently the castings of the parent birds, 

 generally about half an inch thick, and mixed in with 

 earth. He farther thinks there is every reason to sup- 

 pose that both the male and the female come to this spot 

 to eject the refuse of their food for some time before the 

 latter begins to lay, and that they dry it by the heat of 

 their bodies, as they are frequently known to continue 

 in the hole for hours long before laying ; and on this dis- 

 gorged matter the female deposits and hatches her eggs. 

 Belon's account is very similar. From the high author- 

 ity of Montague, the latter description is now copied as 

 authentic by every modern author, with the exception 

 of Temminck, who says nothing on the subject, and 

 Wilson, who says of his belted king-fisher, that " its nest 

 is neither constructed cf glue nor fish-bones." We are 

 certain, says Mr Rennie, in his Architecture of Birds, 

 that this contradiction of the general belief will apply 

 equally to the king-fisher of England. In the bank of a 

 stream at Lee, in Kent, we have been acquainted with 

 one of these nests in the same hole for several successive 

 summers, but so far from the pellets of fish-bones, ejected 

 as is done by all birds of prey, being dried on purpose to 

 form the nest, they are scattered about the floor of the 

 hole in all directions, from its entrance to its termina- 

 tion, without the least order or working up with the earth, 

 and are all moist and fetid. That the eggs may by ac- 



son ; and excludes her first brood about the 

 beginning of April. The male, whose fidelity 

 exceeds even that of the turtle, brings her 

 large provisions of fish while she is thus em- 

 ployed ; and she, contrary to most other birds, 

 is found plump and fat at that season. The 

 male, that used to twitter before this, now 

 enters the nest as quietly and as privately as 

 possible. The young ones are hatched at the 

 expiration of twenty days ; but are seen to 

 differ as well in their size as in their beauty. 



As the ancients have had their fables con- 

 cerning this bird, so have the modern vulgar. 

 It is an opinion generally received among 

 them, that the flesh of the kirig-fisher will not 

 corrupt, and that it will even banish all ver- 

 min. This has no better foundation than that 

 which is said of its always pointing, when 

 hung up dead with its breast to the north. 

 The only truth which can be affirmed of this 

 bird, when killed, is, that its flesh is utterly 

 unfit to be eaten ; while its beautiful plumage 

 preserves its lustre longer than that of any 

 other bird we know. 



Having thus given a short history of birds, 

 I own I cannot take leave of this most beauti- 

 ful part of the creation without reluctance. 

 These splendid inhabitants of the air possess 

 all those qualities than can soothe the heart, 

 and cheer the fancy, the brightest colours, 

 the roundest forms, the most active manners, 

 and the sweetest music. In sending the 

 imagination in pursuit of these, in follow- 

 ing them to the chirping grove, the screaming 

 precipice, or the glassy deep, the mind natu- 

 rally lost the sense of its own situation, and 

 attentive to their little sports, almost forgot 

 the TASK of describing them. Innocently to 



cident be laid upon portions of these fish-bones, is highly 

 probable, for the floor is so thickly strewed with them, 

 that no vacant spot might be found ; but they assuredly 

 are not by design built into a nest. The hole is from 

 two to four feet long, sloping upwards, and narrow at 

 the entrance, but widening in the interior, in order per- 

 haps, to give the birds room to turn ; and for the same 

 apparent reason the eggs are not placed at the extrem- 

 ity. We are somewhat doubtful whether it selects, as 

 is said, the old hole of a water-rat to save itself trouble, 

 the water-rat being the deadly enemy of its eggs and 

 young; but it seems to indicate a dislike to the labour 

 of digging, that it frequents the same hole for a series of 

 years, and will not abandon it, though the nest be re- 

 peatedly plundered. The accumulation of cast bones in 

 one of these old holes has perhaps given origin to the 

 notion of the nest being formed of them. 



Our own opportunities, continues Mr Rennie, of care- 

 fully studying the habits of this bird, lead us to remark, 

 that it is not so very shy and solitary as it has been re- 

 presented, for it has more than once allowed us to ap- 

 proach within a few yards of the bough on which it was 

 perched. The necessity for obtaining its food from 

 streams and shallow ponds causes this bird, however, to 

 frequent secluded places. The belted kingfisher of 

 America, is partial to mill-dams, in defiance of the clack 

 of the hopper, because there he finds facilities in watch- 

 ing for fish. 



