“Expect Saint Martin’s summer, halcyon days.”
Henry VI., Part i., Act i., sc. 2.
It was also supposed that the dead bird, carefully balanced and suspended by a single thread, would always turn its beak towards that point of the compass from which the wind blew. Kent, in King Lear (Act ii. sc. 2), speaks of rogues who—
“Turn their halcyon beaks
With every gale and vary of their masters.”
And, after Shakspere, Marlowe, in his Jew of Malta, says:—
“But how now stands the wind?
Into what corner peers my halcyon’s bill?”
The Common Kingfisher measures about seven inches from the tip of his bill to the end of his tail. The colour of the upper parts is blue, greener on the mantle and scapulars, and beautiful rich cobalt on the back, rump, and upper tail-coverts; the head is blue, barred with black, the wings blue, with spots of brighter cobalt on the coverts; in front of the eye is a spot of rufous, this being also the colour of the eye-coverts and under parts; the throat is white, and there is a patch of white on each side of the neck; the cheeks and sides of the breast are blue, the bill is black, the feet red. The female is coloured like the male, but can always be told by the red colour at the base of the under mandible. This is also present in young birds of both sexes, but the latter can readily be distinguished by their shorter bills.
