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flight and actions reminded us very much of the Kestrel. After rising with a somewhat jerking 

 flight, they would poise themselves for several minutes with a gentle quiver of the wing, and 

 then suddenly drop perpendicularly, beak foremost, for a header, or else glide swiftly onwards to 

 take up another aerial post of observation. They are at all times of the year gregarious in small 

 bands." Mr. Monteiro, who obtained it on the west coast of Africa, sent the following note to 

 Mr. R. B. Sharpe, who published it in his ' Monograph of the Alcedinidse :' viz. " I have fre- 

 quently observed this Kingfisher on all that part of the west coast of Africa that I am acquainted 

 with, namely from Loando to Little Fish Bay. They are to be seen in numbers on every river, 

 lake, or marsh, whether salt or fresh. Their usual habit is to keep steadily in the air on one 

 spot, five or six feet above the surface of the water, by a heavy flapping of the wings, with their 

 beak hanging down, and now and then dropping like a stone to capture the small fish on which 

 they feed. These they fly off with to a twig or branch to swallow, and rise to hover again as 

 before. They are very noisy, uttering a loud trilling note or screech. The natives capture 

 quantities of small fish by driving a row of sticks across the shallow rivers and lagoons to support 

 a dam of twigs and rushes, leaving openings at intervals, in which are placed baskets or traps to 

 catch the fish as they pass out. These Kingfishers are so abundant that I have often seen them 

 standing one on each stick, stretching in a long line across the lagoon, their showy plumage, 

 brightly reflected on the still surface of the placid waters, forming a very striking and pretty 

 sight. They are very tame, taking no notice of people passing by quite close to them, but are 

 very hard to kill, requiring a good and well-directed charge of shot to bring them down, even at 

 a comparatively short distance." Dr. Jerdon says (B. of I. i. p. 233) that in India "it is very 

 common on the banks of rivers, backwaters, and canals, also on the edges of tanks, and even 

 of pools and ditches by the road-side. Unlike the other Kingfishers, which watch for their 

 prey from a fixed station, and then dart down obliquely on it, this one searches for its prey 

 on the wing, every now and then hovering over a piece of water, and, on spying a fish, darting 

 down perpendicularly on it, and rarely failing in its aim. Now and then during its descent 

 it is baulked, and turns off from its swoop ; but I never saw one plunge into the water and 

 turn off from its swoop. I cannot say that I have observed it stay so long under water as 

 Pearson would imply when he states that ' it plunges down dead as a stone under the water, 

 and remains below it so long that the ripple over the surface clears away some time before it 

 comes up again.' Sundevall notices its holding its tail erect when sitting." 



The nesting-season of this Kingfisher appears to be about the month of May ; but Dr. Leith 

 Adams says that in Egypt it has been known to breed in December. Perhaps the best account 

 of its breeding-habits is that given by Canon Tristram, who writes (I. c.) as follows: — "A few 

 breed near the Jordan, in the banks of the Wady Kelt ; but the great breeding-place which we 

 discovered was on the plains of Gennesaret, in the banks of the Ain Mudawarah. Here there 

 was a colony of about thirty pairs, only a small proportion, however, of the birds of this species 

 which feed on the teeming myriads of fishes in the hallowed lake. They selected a different 

 part of the bank, and built in a different position from Halcyon smyrnensis. Shortly before its 

 entrance into the lake, the Mudawarah forms a hollow secluded pool, with deep banks of mud 

 about twenty feet high above the water, which may have a depth of ten or twelve feet. The 

 sides of this little amphitheatre were perforated all round by the holes of the Great Kingfisher, 



