22 ALLEN'S NATURALIST'S LIDRARY. 



XVL THE JAPANESE PHEASANT. PHASL\NUS VERSICOLOR. 



Phasiimus versicolor^ Vieill. Gal. Ois. ii. p. 23, pi. 205 (1825) ; 

 Temm. PI. Col. v. pis. 6 and 7 [Nos. 486, 493] (1830) ; 

 Cassin, Perry's Exp. Jap. ii. p. 223, pi. i (1856) ; Gould, 

 B. Asia, vii. pi. 40 (1857) ; Sclater and Wolf, Zool. Sket. 

 i. pi. 38 (1861) ; Elliot, Monogr. Phas. ii. pi. ix. (1872); 

 Ogilvie-Grant, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. xxii. p. 334 (1893). 



Adult Male. — Easily distinguished from all other species of 

 the genus by having the whole of the under-parts tmiform dark 

 g}'eefi. The mantle is dark green shot with purple, each feather 

 being ornamented with concentric lines of buff, and there is 7io 

 rust-red patch on each side of the rump, which is uniform 

 greenish-slate. In this respect the present species differs from 

 F. torqiiatus ZiX\A all the allied forms with slate-coloured rumps. 

 Total length, 29 inches ; wing, 9*6 ; tail, 17-5 ; tarsus, 27. 



Adult Female. — Much like the female of P. straiichi, but the 

 feathers of the mantle have the centre almost e?itirely black, 

 with sometimes a thin rufous shaft-stripe and the green tips 

 are generally conspicuous ; the black bars on the brenst and 

 flmks are much more strongly marked. Total length, 24 

 inches; wing, 8*2; tail, 10-5; tarsus, 2-2. 



Hange. — The Japanese Islands, except Yezo. 



Habits. — Mr. Heine, who met with this beautiful bird on the 

 hills in the neighbourhood of Simoda, supplies the following 

 account : — " The walk and ascent had fatigued me somewhat ; 

 I had laid down my gun and game-bag, and was just stooping 

 to drink from a little spring that trickled from a rock, when, 

 not ten yards from me, a large Pheasant arose, with loud rust- 

 ling noise, and before I had recovered my gun, he had dis- 

 appeared over the brow of a hill. I felt somewhat ashamed 

 for allowing myself thus to be taken so completely aback ; but 

 noticing the direction in which he had gone, I proceeded more 

 carefully in pursuit. A small stretch of table-land, which T 



