282 MRS. R. HAIG THOMAS ON 



at the Natural History Museum with the males and females of 

 all four laid side by side, afford some ground for the hypothesis. 



Male. P. elegans, dark neck, collar absent, coloration much 



resembles male P. colchicus. 

 Female. P. elegans, dark bird, breast patterned like female 



P. colchicus. 

 Male. P. sechuanensis. 



Crest identical with male P.forinosanus. 



Wing secondaries pattern identical with male 

 P. formosanus. 



Collar three-quarters interrupted at throat, widest 

 at the ends like male Formosan, but the ends 

 are square instead of a vandyke-point like the 

 male P. formosanits. 



Flank-feathers differ, being a, bronze-copper instead 

 of pale cream as those of the male P. formosanus. 

 Female. P. sechuanensis. 



Light bird, breast unpatterned ; strongly resembles 

 P.forinosanus female. 



Tail — lateral rectrices — identical with female P. for- 

 mosanus. 



Wing — secondaries — identical with female P. for- 

 mosanus. 



From the above comparison it might be inferred that a hybrid 

 from a cross between P. elegans and P. sechuanensis would give 

 the same collar segregation as the hybrid between P. colchicus 

 and P. torquatne in our Avoods. Fen wick- Owen's observations on 

 the collar variations in his new pheasant P. stranchi chonensis 

 would appear to be at least very suggestive of the hybrid origin 

 of the bird. 



Mosaic of male and female Secondary Sexual Characters in 

 Common Pheasant. 



I would now draw attention to a remarkable specimen of the 

 common male pheasant (of which a detailed description will be 

 found at the end of this paper) with a curious mosaic of male and 

 female plumage in ti-ansverse section. Colour and pattern are 

 coupled in every case, and where the male and female plumage 

 also differ in structure (the male degenerate, the female normal, 

 as on the posterior back feathers and the tail-coverts) we find all 

 three factors correlated. The bird was a young male bred in 

 May 1913, so there is no question of age having produced the 

 phenomenon. A male P. formosanus had been used for three 

 years previously in the breeding-season in the pheasant pen. 

 From experiments in my own pheasantry I infer that this extra- 

 ordinary bird was a hybrid, which, had it not unfortunately been 

 shot, would have proved sterile, although the testes, on dissection, 



