74 
BIRDS OF BRITISH BURMAH, 
in males the blue on these parts is assumed quickly, in females very slowly 
and some traee of ferruginous in these latter is generally present. 
Iris dark brown ; eyelid dark grey ; gape and base of bill orange ; 
remainder of bill black ; legs bright red ; claws red. The fully adult 
female has the bill the same colour as the male. Young birds have most 
of the lower mandible red and the tips of both white. 
Length 6*2 inches_, tail 1'2, wing 2*5_, tarsus -3^ bill from gape 1*8. The 
female is of the same size. 
From an examination of a magnificent series of these birds in the British 
Museum and of a dozen or more specimens shot by myself in Burmah^ I 
have come to the conclusion that there is only one species inhabiting 
India^ Burmah and the Indian archipelago. The bars on the head vary in 
colour from rich purple in Borneo^ Java &c. to rich blue or even bluish 
green in Burmah ; but the transition is very gradual^ and some of the 
Burmese birds show a distinct tint of purple on the nape. The lower 
plumage is very uniform in all, young and old alike. It is shown beyond 
all doubt by sexed females in the British Museum collected by Mr. Wallace, 
and by birds shot by myself in Burmah, that the fully adult female has 
the cheeks and ear-coverts blue like the male, but generally intermingled 
with a little ferruginous until she becomes aged. 
The Malayan Kingfisher is somewhat locally distributed. I found it 
abundant in the Pegu hills a few miles north of the town of Pegu and also 
in a patch of dense jungle a couple of miles north of Kyeikpadein. Ijord 
Tweeddale received a specimen from Tonghoo. Mr. Davison states that 
it occurs sparingly throughout Tenasserim ; and he and Mr. Hume make 
two species of the birds found in that Division, the richer-coloured bird 
being recorded from Bankasoon only and the greener and duller bird from 
elsewhere. 
It has a wide range, being found in many parts of the peninsula of India 
from the north to the extreme south. It occurs in Cochin China,, the 
Malay peninsula, the Andamaus, Sumatra^ Java, Borneo and some of the 
further islands. 
This species is restricted to the dense forests where the ground is broken 
up by nullahs and ravines. I think it always darts on its prey from a perch 
and does not hover in the air. I have found numerous nests of this bird 
in July in Pegu. The eggs, four to six in number, are laid on the bare 
soil in a chamber at the end of a tunnel dug in the perpendicular face of a 
bank of a ravine among thick vegetation. 
