BELTED KINGFISHER. 81 



FAM. ALCEDINID^. (The Kingfishers.) 



BELTED KINGFISHER.* 



Ceryle Alcyon. 



Alcedo alcyonj LINN. Aud. pi. 77. 



Ceryle alcyon, BOIE. 



ON my arrival in Jamaica in December, I used 

 frequently to see this well-known bird sitting on 

 the bushes that overhang the romantic river of 

 Bluefields, or shooting along on swift wing, over 

 its rapid course. As the spring came on, however, 

 and merged into summer, I ceased to see it, there or 

 elsewhere, no doubt because it had migrated to the 

 north ; the very individuals that I had seen in 

 Jamaica being, perhaps, now in Canada. About 

 the beginning of September it again appeared, 

 rather numerously for a solitary bird, scarcely a 

 morning passing without our seeing one or more 

 along the sea-side. Where the mangrove or the 

 sea-grape stretches its branches down to the water's 

 edge, stopping the way along the yellow beach, 

 the Kingfisher delights to resort, sitting on a pro- 

 jecting twig; here he waits patiently for the ap- 

 proach of some small sh, on which he drops perpen- 

 dicularly, and having seized it in his powerful beak, 



* Length 1 finches, expanse 2l, flexure 6^, tail 3^, rictus 2^, 

 tarsus -^, middle toe ^-. 



