2194 THE GAME BIRDS AND RAILS 



China, and its ally, P. satscheunensis , from the north of the Nan-Shan mountains, 

 as well as in the Formosan pheasant (/*. formosanus), the white ring is well de- 

 veloped. It will thus be seen that the more northern species of both the rufous and 

 gray-rumped groups have a white collar, while in the more southern species of both 

 this is absent, or at best ill-defined. Since it cannot be considered that the individuals 

 with traces of the collar found among the southern species are the results of inter- 

 breeding with the northern ringed species, when their ranges are separated by chains 

 of mountains, we must conclude that the original stock were probably of northern 

 origin, and, like those still inhabiting the higher latitudes, possessed a white ring; 

 that as the species spread gradually southward this characteristic, from some cause 

 or other, has been lost, but that numerous individuals still show traces of a reversion 

 to the ancestral type. Of the aberrant species we may note the Japanese pheasant 

 (P. versicolor), with the under parts uniform metallic green, Elliot's pheasant {P. 

 ellioti}, from the mountains of Southeastern China, and Hume's pheasant {P. 

 hume&}, from Upper Burma and the Shan hills. In the two latter the lower 

 back is black barred with white, and there are only sixteen instead of the normal 

 eighteen tail feathers. Still more different are Soemmerring's pheasant (P. soem- 

 merringi), from Japan, which has the plumage chestnut shot with purplish carmine 

 and fiery gold, and Reeves' s pheasant (P. reevesi), from North China, with its white 

 crown, black collar, tawny plumage, and a tail fully five feet in length in the oldest 

 males. All the members of the genus are polygamous, each cock pairing with 

 several hens. 



Undoubtedly the most gorgeously-adorned members of the whole 

 . , , pheasant family are found in the genus which includes the golden 

 Pheasants an ^ Amherst's pheasants (Chrysolophus pictus and C. amherstice), of 

 the mountains of Eastern Tibet and Western and Southern China. 

 The characteristics distinguishing the males are the long, full crest of hairy feath- 

 ers and the cape-like mass of feathers covering the back of the head and neck, as 

 well as the long tail and its greatly-lengthened upper coverts. The male of the 

 species figured, although possessing fewer brilliant colors than the golden pheasant, 

 has the colors purer and more harmonious. The top of the head, mantle, scapulars, 

 and chest are dark bronze green, the long crest blood red, the feathers forming the 

 cape pure white, margined and barred across the middle with black glossed with 

 steel blue, the lower back and rump widely tipped with yellowish buff barred with 

 dark green, and the long upper tail coverts white, irregularly barred with black and 

 widely tipped with orange scarlet. The wings and under tail coverts are mostly 

 black, with dark purplish green reflections, the long middle tail feathers with 

 arched bars and wavy lines of black, the throat and fore part of the neck brownish 

 black, slightly glossed with green, and the rest of the under parts pure white, 

 barred on the flanks with black. Unlike the golden pheasant, both sexes have a 

 patch of naked blue skin surrounding the eye; but the female has none of the bril- 

 liant plumage of the male, the general color of the upper parts being rufous and 

 buff, marked and barred, especially on the wings and middle tail feathers with dark 

 brown, the outer tail feathers being chestnut mixed with black and barred and 

 tipped with white, and the breast and under parts mostly pale buff, barred on the 



