Distribution of the True Pheasants. 393 



On the west and south its range is bordered by the Ust-Urt 

 and the waterless sands of the Kara-Kura. On the south- 

 east, from the borders of Khiva up- to Chardjui, it is very- 

 scarce indeed, if not wholly wanting, being replaced by the 

 rufous-bellied purple-breasted Ph. zarudnyi. To the north- 

 east it meets somewhere on the shores of the Aral Sea 

 with Ph. turcestanicus, a broadly collared form of Ph. mon- 

 golicus. Mr. Ogilvie-Grant (/. c), citing Th. Pleske (Mem. 

 Ac. Sc. St. P. xxxvi. no. 3, p. 48), adds "Kasalinsk" as 

 locality, but Mr. Pleske expressly states that his birds, 

 although purchased in Kasalinsk on the Syr-Daria, had been 

 brought from the Oxus. 



11. Phasianus chkysomelas hiaxchii, subsp. now [Bi- 

 anchVs Pheasant.) 



" ?" Ph. chrysomelas : 1886, Bianchi, Zur Ornis der west- 

 lichen Auslaufer des Pamir und des Alai, in Mel. biol. t. xii. 

 1. 5, p. 677 (Kafirnagan, Wachsch) ; ? 1896, Zarudny, Orn. 

 Faun. Transcasp. (Russ.), p. 480 (? pt., Karki). 

 Phasiano chrysomelani simillimus, sed pectore juguloqne 

 valde obscurioribus, plumarum margine virescenti-nigro 

 latiore, ai*ea pneapicali autem fnlvo-aurea minore ; colli 

 plumis albo minus variegatis. 

 This Pheasant inhabits the upper parts of the Oxus basin. 

 Messrs. Grum-Grzimailo, duriug their travels in the moun- 

 tains of Buchara in 1885, met with it in the valleys of 

 Kafirnagan (Dschidda-bach) and. Wachsch (Kurgan-Tjube). 

 Dr. V. L. Bianchi has pointed out its differences from the 

 Khivan bird, but has not separated it, on the ground that 

 Ph. chrysomelas varies much even in its typical locality. 

 But Mr. Zarudny's explorations now make it evident that 

 the range of Ph. chrysomelas, as a whole, is not contiguous, 

 but is broadly interrupted in the middle of the Amu-Daria 

 valley, where only Ph. zarudnyi is met with. This geo- 

 graphical isolation makes it advisable to distinguish sub- 

 specifically the form of the upper Oxus. 



Specimens (killed in May) brought home by Messrs 

 Grum-Grzimailo are in somewhat worn plumage, ami in 



SER. VIII. VOL. IV. 2 r 



