ASSAM, SYLHET AND CACHAR. 47 



[Common all over the Dibrugarh district. On two or three 

 occasions I have, when canoeing along the smaller streams that 

 fall into the " Desang " river, seen a large Kingfisher, which 

 certainly was neither this species nor A. heavani. The spots 

 were quiet shady nooks, overhanging deep pools, but although 

 I fired at the birds I could not bag them. Probably they may 

 have been A. grandis referred to by Mr. Hume below.— 

 J. R. C] 



In _ the Eastern hills I caught sight of a large Kingfisher 

 of this type, which may have been A. grandis. I cannot 

 say I have never seen that bird alive, or it may have 

 been A. nigricans, Blyth, or a new species. The bird 

 was below me and going straight away, so that I only 

 saw its ^ back ; but it is more likely to have been grandis, 

 as Godwin-Austen twice thought he saw this in N. Cachar 

 and procured specimens in the Dikrang and the Bura* Dehing. 

 It is a terrible pity I could not fire, for all my specimens are 

 fromSikhim and the Bhutan Dooars, and I had hitherto 

 considered this species as confined to the bases of the hills, 

 and streams running some short distance up, into and out 

 from these north of the Brahmaputra. 



I never saw lS5quat. — Alcedo heavani, Wald. This is a bird 

 I know well, and its absence is the more remarkable that it 

 is not uncommon in N.-E. Cachar, whence and also from 

 Sadiya and various localities in the Dibrugarh district* it has 

 been sent, as also again from Eastern Pegu and many loca- 

 lities in Tenasserim. Had I ever met it I should immediately 

 have recognised it, but I certainly never saw it in Manipur, 

 though it must needs occur, if nowhere else, in the Jhiri valley! 



136.— Oeryle rudis, Lin. 



Never seen in the Eastern or Western hills ; very scarce 

 about the capital and the major portion of the basin, but 

 rather less so towards the south of this. Still, as compared 

 with any part of India proper, the Pied Kingfisher is exces- 

 sively rare even in the basin of Manipur, and I doubt whether 

 from first to last I saw more than a dozen there. 



It is common on all the rivers of Sylhet and Cachar 

 throughout the valley of Assam right up to Sadiya,t and has 

 been sent from the Garo and Khasi hills. It is widely and 

 generally distributed throughout British Burmah. How can its 



_ * [Alcedo heavani is far from rare in the Dibrugarh district, but only seen 

 m rivers and streams whose banks are densely wooded. A $ shot 18th December. 

 1881,measured:-Length, 6 '40; expanse, 90; tail. PSS; win?, 2-64; tarsus 

 0-S5- bill from gape, 2-09 ; weight, O'SO. Bill black, gape dull vermilion, legs 

 and feet bright vermilion.— J. R. C.] ° 



f [Ceryle rudis is very common everywhere in Dibrugarh. —J. R. C] 



