CORACIID^. 117 



soon as a sufficient lining of castings of small bones was provided the hen 

 would commence to lay her eggs upon them. The instinct of the birds 

 led to the choice of a hole ascending upwards from its entrance, so that 

 the watery faeces of the young ones might ran out of the nest, and the 

 stain of this seen at the mouth often betrayed the presence of the family 

 within. When the old birds visit their nest to feed the young they are 

 never observed to carry small fish in their bills, but disgorge their 

 partially digested food for that purpose. After a Kingfisher has caught 

 a small fish it will fly with it to its station, and then hammer it about 

 the head until it has killed it, when it is invariably bolted head foremost. 



One day when we were fishing, a Kingfisher coming suddenly upon us 

 round a sharp bend of the stream dashed itself against our flj'-rod, falling 

 into the water after the contact, but, soon recovering, rose again on wing, 

 and went off with its usual rapid flight. 



Where a drain discharges itself from a marsh into a tidal river, and 

 there is a small culvert and sluice, we generally expect to meet with a 

 Kingfisher, this being a favourite feeding-station, and in such a spot, 

 should the Kingfisher be shot, his place will soon be occupied by another, 

 just as a big trout is succeeded when captured by the next biggest in the 

 favourite hover, or a Woodcock, flushed and bagged from some Avarm 

 shelter beneath a holm-bush in the cover, is replaced, perhaps the very 

 next day, bj^ another Woodcock which has appropriated what, to a Wood- 

 cock's eye, is the best place in all the wood in which to nap throughout 

 the day. 



A few years since when the cruel fashion prevailed (and would that wc 

 could record that it had been now abandoned !) for ladies to decorate 

 their hats and bonnets with brightly plumaged birds, the poor Kingfisher 

 was so persecuted that, in our despair, we looked forward to his speedy 

 extermination. But, whether it be the case or not that the stress of 

 this foolish fashion does not now press so hardly upon this beautiful 

 ornament of our brooks and shores, we are pretty confident that of late 

 years (perhaps through the help of immigrants) his numbers have been 

 recruited, so that he is still to be met with at many of his accustomed 

 haunts. 



Family CORACIID^. 

 Koller. Coracias garrida, Linn. 



An accidental visitor of verj- rare occurrence, and almost confined to 

 the southern ])art of the county. 



So Ijrilliant is the plumage of this handsome bird, which is about the 

 size of a Jay, that its arrival in tliis country from the South cannot long 

 be kept a secret, or the stranger escape dangerous notice and ])ursuit. It 

 is an insect-feeder, chasing and capturing mollis and lieetk's on wing, and, 

 like our well-known Swallow, is a iissirostial or wide-gaped bird. Like 



