36 KINGSFISHER. 



This is a common species in England, as well as in the greater 

 part of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Specimens have been received 

 from China, Bengal, Ceylon, and Egypt,* precisely the same as to 

 colours with ours; that from China seemed to us smaller, and was 

 called Ju-loang. Belon remarks his having met with it in Romania 

 and Graecia ;| and Scopoli notices it as a bird of Carniola,^ where it 

 remains the whole year, as in England; and indeed, it bears in general 

 the rigour of the colder climates, so that it has gained among the 

 Germans the name of Eiszvogel, or Ice Bird.§ Olina speaks of it, as 

 not regarding the ice or cold ; || and Gmelin assures us that it is found 

 in Tartary, Siberia,** and Russia, though only in the temperate 

 parts. It is an uncommon bird in Denmark,tt and not at all found 

 in Sweden, as it does not enter the list of birds in the Fauna Suecica 

 of Linnaeus. It certainly bears the cold of our climate sufficiently 

 well, yet there are few winters in which some of these birds do not 

 appear to perish from cold, as to my knowledge several have been 

 found frozen stiff by the sides of even running water, without the 

 least sign of any mark of violence. It is chiefly seen about fresh 

 water streams, but not unfrequently in the neighbourhood of salt 

 water rivers 4 + 



M. Daubenton is said to have kept Kingsfishers in a cage for 

 several months, by means of small fish put into basins of water, on 

 which they have fed, for they refused all other kinds of nourishment. 



The Kingsfisher lays as far as seven |||| semi-transparent white 

 eggs, in a hole in the bank of a river or stream which it frequents ; 

 sometimes two or three feet in depth, always ascending, and very 

 frequently makes use of an old rat's hole for that purpose ; at the 



* Sonnin. Tr.u. p. 55. f Nat. des Ois. p. 220. % Sco P- Ann - ?• 55 - 



§ Gesner. Av. 551. || Uccel. p. 39. ** Voy. au Siber. ii. 112. ft Midler. 



%X It has been seen at times balancing- itself over the water, in which a great many small 

 round shining beetles* were swimming swiftly in a circular, and which it makes its prey.— 

 Br. Zool. 1812. V. i. 335. |||| Gesner says, as for as nine, Av. p. 514. C. 



* Gyrinus natator, or Glimmerchaffer, Lin.— See Wood's Illustr, of Insects, part i. p. 19. pi. 5. 



