3088 THE ZooLoGist—JUNE, 1872. 
poultry yard. On one occasion, at Otaki, I saw one of these birds dart 
down into the midst of a very young clutch; but the old barn-door hen 
proved too active, aud with one rapid stroke of her bill put the assailant 
hors de combat. The bird was picked up stunned with the blow, but soon 
after recovering itself escaped from the hands of its captor. In Wanganui 
it provoked the hostility of the Acclimatization Society by preying on the 
young of the house sparrow (Passer domesticus), which had been introduced 
at much expense, and the Committee encouraged a crusade against the 
offenders by offering a premium for kingfishers’ heads. According to the 
report of the Auckland Acclimatization Society for 1868—69, it has proved 
very troublesome in destroying birds, and has even attacked and killed a 
Californian quail. In Otago it has been accused of purloining the speckled 
trout; and in Canterbury it was found necessary to protect the newly- 
hatched fish by stretching wire-netting over the shallow artificial streams. 
A valued correspondent, and very careful observer, informs me that on one 
occasion he killed a black fish, about twelve feet long, in Whangarei 
Harbour, and dragged it ashore, and on visiting the place a few days later 
he observed an unusual number of kingfishers present; on watching them 
he found that they were preying on the swarms of flies attracted by the dead 
cetacean, darting after them with the swiftness of an arrow, and capturing 
them on the wing. When engaged in fishing, it does not plunge into the 
stream like the common British kingfisher, but dips into it lightly as itskims 
the surface of the water or darts downwards from its post of observation on a 
rock oroverhanging branch. The New Zealand kingfisher commences to breed 
towards the end of November or early in December, usually selecting for its 
nesting operations a tree denuded of its bark and decayed at heart, standing 
near the margin of the forest or in an old Maori clearing. By means of its 
powerful bill it cuts a round passage through the hard exterior surface, and 
then scoops out a deep cavity, proceeding in a horizontal direction for several 
inches, and then downwards to an extent of ten inches or more. The bird 
thus instinctively protects its chamber from the inclemencies of the weather. 
There is no further attempt at forming a nest, the eggs being deposited on 
a layer of pulverized decayed wood, the shavings and sawdust, so to speak, 
of the borer’s operations in finishing the cavity. The eggs are generally five 
in number, sometimes six, broadly oval in form, and measuring 1.2 inch by 
5.9. They are of the purest white, with a smooth or polished surface and 
very fragile in texture; sometimes the shell is marked by minute limy 
excrescences at the larger end. The labour of boring a cavity is often 
greatly augmented by natural impediments. If, after drilling through the 
hard external surface, the bird finds the inner wood too hard for its tools, it 
at once abandons the spot and sounds the tree in another place. I have 
counted half-a-dozen or more of these abortive borings on a single tree, in 
addition to the finished one, affording evidence of indomitable perseverance 
