1886.] PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 405 



In default of genuine Japanese specimens of the present species I add 

 the following measurements of two Chinese examples : 



' " Total length 16 inches. Eyes yellow." 



[AMAURORNIS Reichb.] 



1852. — Amaurornia Reichenbach, Syst. Av., p. xxi (type Gallinula olivacea Meyen). 

 1852. — Erythra Reichenbach, Syst. Nat., p. xxi (type G. phcenicura Lath.) (nee Ery- 

 thrua Walk., 1829). 



(For name and synonymy, compare Salvadori, AttiAcad. Sc. Torino, 

 XIV, 1879, p. 914.) 



[Amauroruis pboenicurus (Penn.).] 

 White-breasted Water-hen. 



T 1769. — Gallinula phoBnicurusTENNANT, Ind. Zool. (p. 10, pi. ix) (fide A. Newton, Stray 

 Feath.,viii, 1879, p. 415).— Swinhoe, Ibis, 1863, p. 427.— Id., ibid., 1870, 

 p. 364. 



1781. — Eallus phcenicurus FORSTER, Zool. Ind. (p. 19, pi. ix). 



1783. — Fulica chinensis Boddaert, Tabl. PI. Enl., p. 54. 



T . — Gallinula erythrina Bechstein, (ubi ?). 



1822.— Gallinula javanica Horsfield, Tr. Linn. Soc, xiii (p. 196). 



1822. — ^ Ballus sumatranus Raffles, Tr. Linn. Soc., xiii (p. 328). 



1875. — Gallinula erythrura Martens, Preuss. Exp. Ost. Asieu, Zool., i, p. 371. 



The White-breasted Water-hen has a wide range, occurring as it does 

 in India and Ceylon, in the Malayan Peninsula, Sumatra, Java, Borneo, 

 and Celebes; it is also found in the Philippine Islands, South China, 

 Hainan, and Formosa. Its occurrence in some of the southern islands 

 belonging to the Japanese Empire is, therefore, by no means unlikely. 

 In order to facilitate the determination of this easily recognizable bird 

 we add the following description from a Chinese specimen : 



9 ad. ( U. S. Nat. Mus. No. 91801. Hong-Kong, Feb. 26, 1882. P. L. Jouy, No. 241).— 

 Upper surface of body, except forehead and sides of breast, dark bluish slate, more 

 or less washed with olive, especially on the interscapulars, becoming more brownish 

 backward, rump and upper tail-coverts being olive brown; forehead, sides of head, 

 including supercilia, throat and breast anteriorly and upper part of abdomen white; 

 the lower part of the latter and tibiae white washed with cinnamon, sides of belly, 

 crissum, and under tail-coverts light huffy cinnamon ; from the ear-coverts downward 

 a broad, somewhat ill-defined black band separates the dark color of the upper parts 

 from the white of the under surface, disappearing on the sides of the breast ; axillariea 

 and under wing-coverts slaty black, the latter tipped with white. 



