A complete dictionary of the Greek and Roman antiquities explaining the obscure places in classic authors and ancient historians relating to the religion, mythology, history, geography and chronology of the ancient Greeks and Romans, their ... rites and customs, laws, polity, arts and engines of war : also an account of their navigations, arts and sciences and the inventors of them : with the lives and opinions of their philosophers / compiled originally in French ... by Monsieur Danet ; made English, with the addition of very useful mapps.

ALCYON,

The Kings Fisher, a Bird much extoll'd, of whom this Fable is told; That Alcynoe the Daughter of Aeolus, having lost the beautiful Cey••, her Husband, in the Sea, who was the Son of the Day-Star, tormented her∣self with vain Grief; till the Gods, mov'd with Compassion, chang'd her into a Bird, which still searches about the Water for him she lost there. It is a small Bird, and its Note is very mournful. To requite her Love, when she makes her Nest, and sits on her young ones, the Winds are still, and the Sea calm in the sharpest time of Winter: These serene Days are call'd Halcyonian from the Alcyon, and du∣ring them, the Sky is calm, and the surface of the Sea as smooth as a Looking-Glass.

Pliny gives this Description of this Bird, Lib. X. cap. 32. It is, says he, a little bigger than a Sparrow, and of a blue colour, but hath some red

and white Feathers. The smallest of them sing com∣monly among the Reeds. They breed about the mid∣dle of December. Their Nests are round, in the form of a large Bowl, having only a little Hole to go in at.