from Deelfontein, Cape Colony. 333 



tail-feathers is a rare occurrence. This sequence of plumages 

 is illustrated by the series in the British Museum, and, so far 

 as I can see, the sequence is fairly complete. It embraces 

 stages 1-7 in the essay of Colonels Butler and Feilden and 

 Captain Reid. It is difficult to understand why a species, 

 having attained to the beautiful plumage which the grey- 

 headed black birds exhibit, should pass on to the pure grey dress 

 as the above-named authors have declared to be the case. The 

 Deelfontein collection has many specimens of the grey phase, 

 but none which shew a transition from the black bird to the 

 grey. On the contrary, there is a regular gradation, as we 

 perceive by my remarks, from the black young bird through 

 its first moult to the dark slaty grey and then to the pearly 

 grey plumage. 



The Damara-land bird must after all be separated from 

 S. monticola, on account of its creamy-white or pure white 

 crown, and it is decidedly remarkable that in Damara-land 

 also occurs a parallel equivalent to the pearly grey form. 

 This would seem to imply that the black-backed, white- 

 headed, and ashy-whitish birds occur throughout Damara- 

 land and that a state of things exists there parallel to the 

 ease of S. monticola. 



The ashy-grey Chat is Le Traquet Montagnard, jeune age, 

 of Levaillant (vol. iv. pi. clxxxv. fig. 1). So far from being a 

 young bird, it is certainly an adult. It is also S. tephronota 

 of Gurney, Ibis, 1877, p. 343. Seebohm has catalogued 

 this type as a female, but it is a very old male of the grey 

 form. Another name for this species is S. castor Hartlaub, 

 P. Z. S. 1805, p. 747 (figured by Blanford and Dresser, 

 P. Z. S. 1874, pi. xxxviii. fig. 2). 



The "Traquet Montagnard" of Levaillant (pi. clxxxiv. fig. 2) , 

 upon which the name of S. monticola was founded, was a 

 young bird in black plumage. We have several specimens 

 in the Museum which exactly match it, and the figure given 

 by Levaillant as " Le moyen age" (pi. clxxxv. fig. 2) is really 

 that of the adult male of the grey-headed black- backed Chat. 

 This is also the true S. leucomelcena of Burchell, which was 

 discovered on the Asbestos Mountains near the Orange River. 



