73 
BIRDS OF BRITISH BURMAH. 
Family ALCEDINID^E. 
Subfamily ALCEDININ^. 
Genus ALCEDO, Linn, 
462. ALCEDO BENGALENSIS. 
THE LITTLE INDIAN KINGFISHER. 
Alcedo bengalensis, Gm. Syst. Nat.i.^. 450; Jerd. B. Ind.i. p. 230; S7iarpe,Mon. 
Alced. p. 11, pi. 2 ; Hume, Nests and Eggs, p. 107 ; Hume 8f Henders. Lah. to 
Yark. p. 178; Salvad. Ucc. Born. p. 92 ; Hume, S. F. i. pp. 168, 169, iii. 
p. 52 ; Bl. B, Burm. p. 71 ; Armstrong, S. F. iv. p. 307 ; David et Oust. Ois. 
Chine, p. 74 ; Legge, Birds Ceylon, p. 292 ; Anders. Yunnan Fxped. p. 580 ; 
Wardlaw Ramsay, Ibis, 1877, p. 457 ; Hume 8f Dav. iS. F. yi. p. 81 ; Hume, 
S. F. viii. p. 86; Bingham, S.F. ix. p. 155. 
Description. — Male and female. Forehead,, crown and nape blackish 
banded with pale blue ; a band from the nostrils through the eye to the 
end of the ear-coverts bright rufous ; cheeks and a band under the ear- 
coverts blackish mottled with blue ; a patch of white on each side the neck ; 
chin and throat white; under plumage and under wing-coverts bright 
rufous or chestnut; centre of the back, rump and upper tail-coverts 
glistening blue ; wing-coverts dark brown speckled with blue ; quills dark 
brown edged with blue ; scapulars dull brownish blue ; tail pale blue. 
Bill dark blackish brown, tinged with reddish at the gape ; mouth 
salmon-colour ; iris brown ; eyelids plumbeous ; legs orange-red ; claws 
dark horn. 
Length 6*8 inches, tail 1*45, wing 2'75, tarsus '35, bill from gape 1*9. 
The female is quite as large as the male, but has the base of the lower 
mandible reddish. 
The amount of banding on the head and the intensity o£ colouring on 
both the upper and under plumages vary much in this species ; they are 
not, however, dependent on sex, but probably on age. j4. ispida, the 
common European Kingfisher, diflPers in being larger, with a proportionately 
smaller bill and is also duller in coloration. 
The Little Indian Kingfisher is found in all the low-lying parts of 
Burmah and Karennee, except perhaps in those portions of the former 
which lie immediately near the sea. 
Elsewhere it has an immense distribution, extending on the west as far 
as Eastern Africa, on the north to Siberia and Japan, and ranging thence 
to China, Siam^ Cochin China, the Malay peninsula^ and most of the 
islands of the Malay archipelago. 
