i8 <I(4{MBLES OF A <DOtMINIS 



whence the wind was blowing. This is what is meant in 

 " Lear," when the outspoken Earl of Kent talks of the 

 smiling rogues who 



" turn their halcyon beaks 



With every gale and vary of their masters." 



Marlowe, too, in " The Jew of Malta," asks, " Into what 

 corner peers my halcyon's bill ? " In a book on birds, 

 published in this century, the writer speaks of having 

 seen in this country a dead kingfisher, which its owner 

 declared never failed to turn its beak to the right point 

 of the compass. 



No less full of marvels are the accounts of the halcyon's 

 nest given by the old writers. And although no modern 

 writer has been found to copy without question, as 

 Montaigne did, the fables of Pliny and Plutarch, some 

 uncertainty has, until quite recent times, obscured the 

 life history of this well-known bird. In Goldsmith we 

 read that the nest is made of willow-down. Aldrovandus 

 describes it as lined with flowers of water plants. 



The Halcyon Days of the old legend were in the 

 winter- time ; but it is well on in the summer generally 

 when the modern kingfisher lays her eggs. She digs 

 with her beak a hole three or four inches in diameter, 

 and varying in length from two to four feet, in the 

 bank of a stream near her haunt, or among the willow 

 roots that the river has laid bare. Sometimes, however, 

 she chooses a spot a long way from the water. 



There still seems some difference of opinion as to the 

 nest itself. One high authority describes it as made of 



