1 5 ALLEN 'S NATURAfJSX's LIBRARY. 



Adult Pemale. — Closely resembles the female of P. colchkus. 



Range. — South-east of the Caspian Sea, Ashourada Island, 

 and the Peninsula of Potemkin ; extending to the east, along 

 the valleys of the Atrak, Sumbar, and Chandir Rivers. 



in. THE PRINCE OF wales' pheasant, phasianus 



PRINCIPALIS. 



Phfisitnuis principalis^ Sclater, P. Z. S. 1885, p. 322, pi. xxii. ; 



Sharpe, Trans. Linn. Soc. (2) Zool. v. p. 86, pi. vii. (1889) ; 



Ogilvie-Grant, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. xxii. p. 325 (1893). 

 riiasianus konia?-ozvii, Bogd. Bull. Acad. St. Petersb. xxx. p. 



356 (1886). 



Adult Male. — ^lay be easily distinguished Ijy having the Avhite 

 wing-coverts of F. persicns, but, unlike that species, the rump is 

 bronze-red, and practically there is no purple-lake gloss on the 

 loNver back, rump, and upper tail-coverts ; the feathers of the 

 chest and breast are broadly tipped with purplish-red bronze, and 

 the flank-feathers are broadly tipped with dark purplish-green. 

 Total length, 35*5 inches; wing, 9-4; tail, 21-5; tarsus, 27. 



Adult Female. — Much paler than the female of P. colchicus 

 and P. persicus, the ground-colour of the feathers of the mantle 

 being paler rufous, and the general colour of the re-t of the 

 plumage /c?^ sandy-buff. It is extremely similar to the female 

 of jP. c/irysonielas, from the Amu-Darya, described below, having 

 the black spots on the middle of the chest-feathers more 

 strongly marked than in the other allied species. 



Range. — Norlh-western Afghanistan and north-east Persia. 



Haljits. — This extremely handsome species was first dis- 

 covered in 1884 by the members of the Afghan Delimita- 

 tion Commission, and Dr. J. \l. T. Aitchison, the naturalist 

 attached to the Expedition, prepared some beautiful skins. 

 He informs us that " the specimens of this Phtasant were all got 

 on the banks of the Bala-Morghab, where it occurs in con- 



