142 SOME CHINESE VERTEBRATES. 



us, is within the limit of failure, if one should have a single unusually large 

 specimen of one species, or a single unusually small one of the other. 



Scores of pheasants of these two species were shot for food, and Mr. Zappey's 

 notes were based on infinitely more material, than the comparatively small 

 series made into skins. Transportation and space had constantly to be con- 

 sidered where large birds were concerned. 



We cannot leave this subject without noticing Buturlin's Distribution of 

 the true pheasants (Ibis, July, 1904, ser. 8, 4, 377-414). For the systematic 

 part of this very convenient summary we have only praise. This author has 

 turned out a piece of work vastly better than that of any of his predecessors, 

 and has also clearly shown the number of recognizable races and species into 

 which pheasants in a state of undisturbed nature, divide and the very small 

 area usually occupied by each. 



On points of synonymy however, he is in some cases, entirely in the wrong. 



It would be, we admit, an easy way of avoiding difficulties if when with 

 adequate material a wide ranging, variable species is divided into its natural 

 subspecies, the names of early authors could be ignored. This high-handed 

 practice, however, can not be allowed. Buturlin disregards the fact that 

 Gmelin's name Phasianus torquatus for the collared pheasant of China was 

 quite adequate to Gmelin's time and must stand. P. torquatus torquates must 

 be used for some subspecies. We therefore use it for the one of southeastern 

 China, to which Buturlin gave the name P. holder -eri gmelini: first, because 

 this was apparently the last race left without a name; secondly, because 

 Buturlin himself thinks it most probably the one to which Gmelin's name 

 was applied; and thirdly, because it was the form to which David and Oustalet 

 restricted the name. 



Equally unpardonable on this author's part is his treatment of Phasianus 

 torquatus pallasi Rothschild. Later when ample material shows that an author 

 confused two or more forms under one name it is not customary to discredit the 

 earlier authors' species entirely, but to restrict his name to one of the forms. 



PHASIANUS ELEGANS Elliot. 



Eleven specimens, adults of both sexes and two small chicks, Washan, 

 Tachienlu, and Tashanling, western Szechwan, 6,000 to 10,000 feet, summer, and 

 autumn. 



A female taken at Kiating in the lowlands of south central Szechwan, 



