KINO QUAIL. 229 



Breeding -season. August to January. March and April in Central Queensland. 



Incubation-period. (In captivity) eighteen to twenty days. 



Distribution and forms. Eastern Asia from China to India and though the 

 Philippines, etc., to Eastern Australia. The extra-limital forms have been imper- 

 fectly studied and the subspecies are not well known ; four names have been given 

 to Australian birds and three subspecies may be easily recognised but the names need 

 rearrangement. Gould named the Australian bird as a species and in 1912 Mathews 

 selected Queensland as the restricted type locality, but when Witmer Stone studied 

 the Gouldian collection in Philadelphia he selected a specimen from South Australia 

 as " the type," and Mathews renamed the Queensland form from Cairns. However, 

 the type could not be in the Philadelphia collection, as the species was not named 

 until 1865, and therefore Mathews's locality selection must be maintained, especially 

 as the Queensland birds agree better in size with Gould's measurements ; therefore 

 we have E. chinensis australis Gould from mid-Queensland, probably to Glencoe, 

 Northern Territory (the type locality of Mathews's E. c. colletti, but which may be 

 separable by paler coloration) ; E. c. cairnsce Mathews, from North Queensland, a 

 darker form above and below ; and E. c. victories. Mathews from Victoria, New South 

 Wales, and South Australia, a larger form, also lighter than preceding and with a 

 narrower white band on the throat. A somewhat variable species which will repay 

 still further study. 



SUBOBDER TURNICIFORMES. 



The little Button Quails, superficially like Quails, but without a hind-toe, 

 have peculiar internal features, and as these have been misunderstood by anatomists 

 they have been removed from the near vicinity of the Galli, to which they un- 

 doubtedly belong. The Plain Wanderer resembles these but has retained the hind- 

 toe and is regarded as representing a distinct family, especially as internal modifica- 

 tions are recorded. It is confined to the south central portion of Australia, whereas 

 the Button Quails range from South Europe and North Africa through India to 

 Australia, where they are most strongly represented. The skull is very peculiar, 

 having the palate of a pattern named eegithognathous, which is otherwise unknown 

 in this connection, but here again there can be little doubt that this is a false 

 segithognathism, and that it has been produced from a state of schizognathism, 

 such as is always seen in the Galli. The nasals are recorded as schizorhinal, but 

 it is admitted that this is a pseudo-schizorhiny and is of holorhinal origin. There 

 are well-marked basipterygoid processes and the lachrymals fuse with the ecteth- 

 rnoids . There are fifteen cervical vertebrae and the sternum shows a pair of long 

 postero -lateral processes as in the Galliformes. The carotids are variable, and the 

 tracheo-bronchial syrinx is somewhat degenerate ; the digestive system is somewhat 

 peculiar, the caeca long. The muscle formula is variable, as is also the presence 

 of the expansor secundariorum. The oil gland is tufted and the aftershaft present 

 and the wing aquincubital or quincubital. The pterylosis is abnormal and the 

 downy nestling is typically Galline. 



FAMILY TURNICID^E. 



Until recently all the Button Quails were referred to a single genus, but super- 

 ficially they show variation, so that many genera are here admitted ; no investigation 

 has yet been made as to the differences in the internal features of the species, but 

 in the few species yet examined variation has been noted. Thus, the syrinx shows 

 variation in detail, while skeletal items have been recorded and even the leg muscles 



are not constant, the accessory femoro-caudal being present in some cases, though 



generally absent. Other features require comparison. 



