204 GALLIFORMES CHAP. 



ninae generally, besides such points as the loss of the Peacock's 

 train in summer, and the innumerable phases of plumage of 

 the Ked Grouse, Ptarmigan, and "Bob -white" (Ortyx), none of 

 which can be usefully discussed in a limited space. 



The range of the Family is nearly cosmopolitan ; but the 

 Meleagrinae only occur in the United States and Central America ; 

 the Numidinae in Africa, with Madagascar and the neighbouring 

 islands : and the Phasianinae in the Palaearctic and Indian 

 Eegions as far eastward as the Philippines, China and Japan, 

 and in the case of Gallus Celebes. The Perdicinae are 

 found in the Palaearctic, Indian and Australian Eegions, though 

 becoming decidedly scarce in Oceania ; the Odontophorinae occupy 

 temperate and tropical America to Bolivia and Brazil south- 

 wards ; while the Tetraoninae are holarctic, the New World 

 genera being more numerous than those of the Old World, and 

 Lagopus alone being common to both hemispheres. 



Sub-fam. 1. Numidinae. Of the curious-looking Guinea-fowls, 

 or Pintados, Acryllium vulturinum of East Africa has a long, wedge- 

 shaped tail, and elongated hackles on the mantle, chest, and lower 

 neck ; the upper neck and head being naked and blue, with a cres- 

 centic nuchal band of short chestnut feathers, and each metatarsus 

 possessing four or five knobs in the male. The hackles are black 

 and white, mostly fringed with blue; the remaining upper parts 

 and the flanks are black spotted with white, having a purple wash 

 on the latter ; the breast and belly are cobalt, marked with black 

 centrally. Gutter a contains four black species with light blue 

 spots, which show much white on the secondaries. A full and 

 usually curly black crest adorns the crown ; the bare head and 

 neck, with its posterior flap of skin, is blue or purplish, and the 

 throat is red, except in G. puclierani of East Equatorial Africa, 

 where the hind-neck only is blue, and G. eduardi (verreauxi) of 

 South Africa, with no bright colours on the head, neck, or throat. 

 The latter, and G. cristata of northern West Africa, have rudimentary 

 blue wattles at the gape, coupled with a black collar, which in 

 G. eduardi extends to the breast and assumes a chestnut shade. 

 G. plumifera, ranging from Cape Lopez to Loango, has larger 

 wattles and a thin erect crest ; G. puclierani has the outgrowths 

 red. This genus and the next have no spurs. Numida, remark- 

 able for the bony casque surmounting the naked head and 

 neck, possesses seven or more members of clumsy build, with 



