Chap. VIII.] SWALLOWS. SUN BIRDS. 



249 



taming them have been found far in the interior, a fact 

 which complicates the still unexplained mystery of the 

 composition of their nest; and, notwithstanding the 

 power of wing possessed by these birds, adds something 

 to the difficulty of believing that it consists of glutinous 

 material obtained from algae. 1 In the nests brought 

 to me there was no trace of organisation-f and the 

 original material, whatever it be, is so elaborated by 

 the swallow as to present somewhat the appearance and 

 consistency of strings of isinglass. The quantity of 

 these nests exported from Ceylon is trifling. 



Kingfishers. — In solitary places, where no sound 

 breaks the silence except the gurgle of the river as 

 it sweeps round the rocks, the lonely Kingfisher, the 

 emblem of vigilance and patience, sits upon an over- 

 hanging branch, his turquoise plumage hardly less 

 intense in its lustre than the deep blue of the sky 

 above him ; and so intent is his watch upon the passing 

 fish that intrusion fails to scare him from his post. 



Sun Birds. — In the gardens the tiny Sun Birds 2 

 (known as the Humming Birds of Ceylon) hover all 

 day long, attracted to the plants, over which they hang 

 poised on their glittering wings, and inserting their 

 curved beaks to extract the insects that nestle in the 

 flowers. 



Perhaps the most graceful of the birds of Ceylon in form 

 and motions, and the most chaste in colouring, is the 

 one which Europeans call " the Bird of Paradise," 3 and 



1 An epitome of what has been found the nests of the Esculent 



written on this subject will be Swallow eighty miles distant from 



found in Br. Horsfield's Catalogue the sea. 



of the Birds in the E. I. Comp. 2 Nectarina Zeylanica, Linn. 



Museum, vol. i. p. 101, &c. Mr. 3 Tchitrea paradisi, Linn. 

 Morris assures me, that he has 



