Mr. P. L. Sclater on Pere David's Travels in China. 167 



before publishing it as new, to the inspection of Mr. R. B. 

 Sharpe, who also declares it to be uudescribecl. Only one 

 specimen was obtained. Wings and tail very short. 



Bremeu, March 5, 1874. 



XX. — Notice of Pere David's Travels in China. 

 By P. L. Sclater. 



The recently completed seventh volume of the ' Nouvelles 

 Archives du Museum d^Histoire Naturelle de Paris' contains 

 a most interesting report, addressed to the Professors of the 

 museum by the celebrated traveller, Pere Armand David, on 

 his travels in the interior of China. So little is generally 

 known concerning the exact countries in which Pere David's 

 extraordinaiy zoological discoveries were made, that we pro- 

 pose to give a short abstract of tliis memoir for the informa- 

 tion of our readers. 



Pere David started from his residence in the province of 

 Pekin on the 26th of May, 1868, and retm-ned from his ex- 

 pedition, after an absence of twenty-five months, on the 24th 

 of June, 1870. The first halting-place on his route Avas at 

 Ching-kiang, in the province of Kiangsu, in Central China, 

 where four months were passed in waiting for a favourable 

 opportunity of continuing his travels westwards. This locality 

 having been already accessible to Europeans for the last eight 

 years, and not being very rich in animal life, only thirty species 

 of birds were obtained there. Amongst these, however, were 

 the new Nuthatch, described by Verreaux as Sitta sinensis, 

 and other species new to the Museum of Paris. 



It was not until the 13th November, 1868, that Pere David 

 succeeded in making arrangements to quit Kiangsu and to 

 ascend the Yangtze- Kiang, or, as the Chinese call it, the Ta- 

 Kiang or Great River. He proceeded by steamer as far as 

 Hankow, and thence in a Chinese junk through a series of 

 canals and lakes towards the ancient city of Ichang. After 

 eight or ten days of this slow navigation, the Great River was 

 rejoinerl, and the traveller entered a larger junk, which was 



N 2 



