KINGFISHERS 
INGFISHERS must be numbered among 
the commonest birds in India. They are 
fowl which observe Friday every day of 
their lives, They do this because they like 
fish. Quite a large number of the winged community 
subsist on a fish diet: there are the cormorants, the 
osprey, the fishing owl, and a host of other interesting 
fishermen, accounts of which would certainly fill a 
large book. 
Three species of kingfisher are very common in all 
parts of India. Aledo ispida, the common kingfisher, 
of course occurs; this bird is distributed all over the 
Old World. The variety found in India is much smaller 
than the one we see in England, and used to be con- 
sidered a different species and called Alcedo bengalensis. 
Naturalists, however, are now agreed that both the 
large and the small races form but one species. The 
difference in size is usually attributed to climatic influ- 
ences; it is held that in the hot climate of India the 
bird does not attain its full devolopment. 
With all due respect to those who entertain this 
theory, I would point out that the common kingfisher 
found in those parts of the Himalayas where the winter 
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