ON PHASIANUS IGNITUS AND ITS NEAREST ALLIES. 169 



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NOTE XXVII. 

 ON PHASIANUS IGNITUS AND ITS NEAREST ALLIES 



BT 



Dr. J. BÜTTIKOFER. 



While working out the ornithological results of the 

 Dutch expedition to Central Borneo, I had to decide which 

 name to bestow upon the Bornean Crested Fire-back , 

 generally known as Euplocamus nobilis Scl., but afterwards 

 united with E. ignitus Lath, by Elliot (Ibis 1878, p. 

 414), and lately also by Ogilvie Grant in his Catalogue 

 of the Game Birds in the British Museum. 



A comparison of the Bornean specimens in the Leyden 

 Museum with our very interesting other representatives of 

 the Genus *) convinced me that we have to acknowledge 

 not only two, as Elliot (1. c.) proposes, but four well- 

 defined species , as will be fully explained hereafter in the 

 key to the species. 



1) Mr. Grant has , for reason of priority , substituted the generic name 

 Euplocamus, under which the group is generally known, by the older name 

 Lophura Fleming, under the genus Lophura Mr. Grant comprises the Fire- 

 backed Pheasants with a black crest on the head, including L. Diardi from 

 Siam and Cochin China. For the sake of convenience I propose, however, to 

 restrict the generic name Lophura to the crested Fire-backs with blue face 

 and white or fulvous centre tail-feathers. Lophura Diardi differs so 

 strikingly from the other Fire-backs, that it had never been mixed up with 

 the synonymy of the latter. It has the naked parts of the head red instead 

 of blue, and the tail of the male is entirely black. Moreover is the modus of 

 coloration of the plumage, in the male as well as in the female, so thoroughly 

 different , that there is more than sufficient reason to separate it generically 

 under the name of Biardigallus Bp. 



Notes from the Leyden ÜMuseuiri, Vol. XVII. 



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