1687.] PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 273 



Oiistalet (Bull. Xouv. Arcli. Mas., VIII, 1872, pi. G) has iiothino- to indi- 

 cate young age, or immaturity ; the face is apparently quite bare of 

 featbers, and the quills are in that bigb state of coloration only found 

 in the adult bird. I am the more convinced of the correctness of this 

 view by the fact that I have before me a Ja])anese specimen, which to 

 all appearance is younger than the one represented in the figure quoted 

 above, which has still a stripe of downy feathers down the middle of 

 the fore crown, and the outer quills more or less dusky with hardly any 

 trace of salmon color ; yet the rest of the plumage is pure white. I 

 therefore agree with Mr. Oustalet in legardiug the Tshe-kiangbird as a 

 local race* of the true Eosy or Japan Ibis. 



It would be a promising field for local ornithologists to work out the 

 history of this beautiful species. Swinhoe, in the Ibis for 1873, has some 

 good notes on its feeding habits, accompanied by observations on the 

 changes of plumage, etc., but his statements are rather obscure, and, I 

 think, somewhat confused. In one place (p. 251) he describes the 

 plumage of the adult as being " of a lovely rosy white," while two 

 pages previously he speaks of being toW in April " that they were put- 

 ting on their dark breeding-feathers." "A full-fledged bird of the 

 year" he describes as being "of a dusky cream-color washed lightly with 

 rosy," and "its cheeks and over the eye were covered with small downy 

 feathers, while the rest of its face was bare and colored orange-yellow 

 instead of red." The "male, after autumnal moult," he says, has " the 

 general plumage rosy; wings shorter than in the adult, and wanting 

 its flammeous lateral rectrices, moulting into the flame-colorof the adult 

 dress." The changes of plumage he sums up as follows {op. cit., p. 253) : 



The young are fully fledged and have the appearance of adult birds by April. » * * 

 The young retain their grey phimage throughout the summer, associating with adults, 

 even while the latter are continuing their nesting-duties, and moult about October, 

 when they change their attire for a white robe with a tinge only of rosiness, their 

 wings and tail alone remaiiaing the same ; but these get abraded and the former 

 fades, and occasionally some quills are cast, to be renewed by others of the early 

 spring suit which these birds of the year put on before breeding. 



The two Japanese specimens before me are females collected in Jan- 

 uary, and probably birds of the foregoing year. They are nearly pure 

 white all over with a faint salmon-colored glow on the concealed parts 

 of the feathers, especially the inner secondaries, upper wing-coverts 

 and under tail-coverts; the two outer primaries are of a nearly uniform 

 dark drab-gray, while the two next to them are white mottled with the 

 same color. 



It should be remarked, that the "glow" of salmon-color, or perhaps 

 rather saturn-red, fades very soon in museum specimens. 



* Mr. D. G. Elliott, Ibis, 1877, p. 497, says that he agrees "with M. Oustalet (/. c) 

 that they are only the young of the present species " [?nj;jJon], but O. does not regard 

 it as the young. On the contrary, he {I. c.) calls it " var. sinensis : omni sestate juveni 

 inijjponisi simillima." 



Proc. IS". M. 87 18 



