Birds of Celebes: Phasianidae. 5(55 



Distribution. India — except N. W. (Jerdon, etc. e 8, 39]; Ceylon (Legge, etc. e 8]\ 

 Bui-mah (Gates .9, 14, 22); Tenasserun (Davison k 1, etc.); South China (Swinhoe .3, 

 De La Touche 38); Formosa and Hainan (Swinhoe 6, 8); Malay Peninsida 

 (Cantor & Maingay 39, Davison 13, Kelham 19); Sumatra (H. 0. Forbes 20, 

 Modigliani 37); Java (Horsfield <S, Bernstein e 3, e 4, etc); Bilhton (Vorderman 

 33, 36); Borneo (Mottley e 5, Low 12, etc.); Palawan (Whitehead 29); Luzon 

 fSonnerat, Mait.-Heriot 27); Negros (Steere 31); Cebu (Burger in Dresd. Mus.); 

 Mindanao (Platen in Dresd. Mus.); Sooloo Is. — Sooloo (Guillem. 24), Bongao 

 (Everett 41); Panay, Cebu, Masbate, Calamianes (Bourns & Worcester / 2); Celebes 

 — Minahassa (P. &F. Sarasin), Gorontalo Distr. (v. Rosenb. j 1, Joest d 2), Ma- 

 cassar (Wallace g 1, 89, P. & F. S. 44); Halmahera (Wallace, Bernst. g 7), 

 Ternate (Fischer jr S); AustraHa — Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and 

 South Australia (Ramsay i 3). 



Introduced into Mauritius (E. Newton h 1) and ? Bourbon (Maillard 5, e 7). 



Within the wide range — India to South Australia — shown above, this 

 minute Quail is subject to some local modifications. Gould recognised three 

 species, separating Wallace's specimens from South Celebes as E. minima, "the 

 smallest of the Galh'?iaceae" , and calling the Australian birds E. australis. Mr. 

 Ogilvie-Grant groups his specimens as belonging to two ^forms, the typical 

 E. chinensis ranging from India and China to Malacca, reoccurring in Celebes 

 and Ternate, and E. lineata (Scop.)M of the Philippines, Borneo, Sumatra and 

 Java, with which the Australian birds are united. E. lineata is said to be darker 

 above, more strongly blotched with black ; the female more strongly barred below. 

 So far as can be judged from the specimens in the Dresden Museum we should 

 say that Australian birds alone bear out the differences to which Mr. Grant 

 draws attention; the Sarasins' North Celebesian examples (the bird seems pos- 

 sibly to differ somewhat in the South) cannot be separated from others from the 

 Philippines and Borneo; they are neither paler nor, as Gould believed, smaller. 

 If the birds of any special locality be separated by name, it appears to us that 

 these should be those of Australia (as E. chinensis australis by those who make 

 use of trinomials, or by some other sign by others), but there is so much still 

 to be learnt about the variation of the species that it will be a long time before 

 it is possible to define its local differences with accuracy. Till then nothing is 

 gained by applying names ; they only suggest knowledge which we have not got. 



In some parts of its range the Chinese Quail is a migrant; this Mr. Gates 

 repeatedly states to be the case in Pegu, where it arrives in great numbers 

 with the rains in May; in the Lucknow Division of India also it is only to be 

 found, so far as Mr. lie id (17) could ascertain, during the rains. In some other 

 quarters it is known to be a resident; this, for instance, is the case, according 

 to Inglis (i6), in N. E. Cachar, and, according to Legge, at Colombo, Ceylon. 

 It has been recorded as a breeding species in India, Ceylon, Burma, Formosa, 



•) It appears certain that Scopoli founded his species on Sounerat's Petite Caille de Flsle de 

 Liicnii, though it is perfectly impossible to identify the bird by his description. Sounerat figures the female 



Meyer A- Wigl eswortli, Birds of Celebes (Nov. 2:ini IS'J"). 84 



