It is said to take the young Parrots from their holes and kill them, but this I never witnessed; the stomachs of the many I dissected contained nothing but the remains of coleoptera. The breeding-season lasts from September to December; and the eggs, which are three and sometimes four in number, are deposited in the hole of a tree without any nest; they are of a beautiful pearly white, considerably pointed at the smaller end; their medium length is one inch and five lines, and breadth one inch and two lines. The sexes are alike in plumage. Head and neck dark brown, passing into the sea-green of the upper surface, and deepening into black on the lores; spurious wing, outer webs of the basal half of the quills, outer webs of the secondaries and the basal half of the outer webs of the tail-feathers vivid blue; six of the primaries with a greenish white basal band; extremities of the primaries black; tail green at the base, black at the tip; throat vivid blue, with a stripe of lighter blue down the centre of each feather; under surface of the shoulder and abdomen light green; under surface of the inner webs of the primaries, and of all but the two centre tail-feathers deep blue, the former interrupted by the greenish white band; irides dark brown; eyelash, bill and feet red; inside of the mouth yellow. The figures are of the natural size. [Illustration: DACELO GIGANTEA: _Leach_. _J. Gould and H. C. Richter del et lith._ _C. Hullmandel Imp._ ] DACELO GIGANTEA, _Leach_. Great Brown Kingfisher. _Alcedo gigantea_, Lath. Ind. Orn., vol. i. p. 245. —— _fusca_, Gmel. edit. of Linn. Syst. Nat., vol. i. p. 454. _Grand Martin-pêcheur de la Nouvelle Guinée_, Son. Voy., p. 171. pl. 106.—Buff. Hist. des Ois., tom. vii. p. 181.—Pl. Enl. 663.? _Martin Chasseur_, Temm. Man. d’Orn., 2nd edit. p. lxxxviii. _Giant Kingfisher_, Shaw, Gen. Zool., vol. viii. p. 53. _Great Brown Kingfisher_, Lath. Gen. Syn., vol. ii. p. 609.—Ibid. Supp., vol. ii. p. 143.—White’s Journ., pl. in p. 137.—Phill. Voy., pl. in p. 287.—Lath. Gen. Hist., vol. iv. p. 9. _Dacelo gigantea_, Leach, Zool. Misc., vol. ii. p. 126. pl. cvi.—Vig. and Horsf. in Linn. Trans., vol. xv. p. 204.—Swains. Class. of Birds, vol. ii. p. 335. _Choucalcyon australe_, Less. Traité d’Orn., p. 248. _Paralcyon gigas_, Gloger. _Alcedo gigas_, Bodd. _Dacelo gigas_, G. R. Gray, Gen. of Birds, 2nd edit. p. 14. _Gogo-bera_, Aborigines of New South Wales. _Laughing Jackass_ of the Colonists.