REEVES'S PHEASANT 157 



The first mention in literature, a reference oblique but quite recognizable, we find 

 in the journal of the daring Venetian traveller, Marco Polo, who spent the seventeen 

 years from 1281 to 1298 in Tartary. Eschewing the original text, and following the 

 quaint orthography of the first English translation of his work, we read, ''There be 

 plenty of Feysants and very greate, for i of them is as big as 2 of ours, with tayles of 

 eight, 9 and tenne spannes long, from the Kingdom of Erguyl or Arguill, the W. side 

 of Tartary." There is no other "Feysant" than Reeves to which this description 

 could well apply. 



Over five hundred years passed without a further reference to the bird. The first 

 descriptions in ornithological works were based upon drawings made at second-hand 

 and tail feathers. Latham in 1823, calling the bird the Bar-tailed Pheasant, says: "I 

 had an opportunity of seeing a bundle of thirty or forty of these tail feathers, which 

 were brought from China, and I found amongst them specimens of every length from 

 18 inches to 7 feet." The first good likeness of this pheasant was published by Tem- 

 minck in 1830 in his "Planches Coloriees " under the erroneous name of veneratus. 

 The previous year J. E. Gray named it after Mr. Reeves. 



SYNONYMY 



Pkasianus superbiisY'iQiW. {nee Linn.) N. Diet. d'Hist. Nat., XI. 1817, p. 40; Jard. Nat. Lib. Orn., IV. 

 1834, p. 202 ; Lamprey, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1862, p. 220 [N.E. of Pekin]. 



Bar-tailed Pheasant Latham, Gen. Hist., VI IL 1823 ; p. 196, pi. CXXIV. 



Pkasianus reevesii J. E. Gray, in Griff., ed. Cuv., III. 1829, p. 25 ; id. 111. Ind. Zool., I. 1830-32, pi. 39; 

 G. R. Gray, List of Birds, pt. III. Gall., 1844, p. 24; id. Gen. B., III., 1845, P« 497) Sclater and Wolf, Zool. 

 Sket. 2, 1861, pi. 33 ; Sclater, List of Phas. 1863, p. 5, pi. i [North and Central China] ; Swinhoe, Proc. Zool. 

 Soc, 1863, p. 307; Saurin, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1866, p. 437 [Chl-li] ; David, N, Arch. Mus. Bull, III., 1867, p. 37 [near 

 Toung-Liu] ; Gray, List Gallinae Brit. Mus. 1867, p. 28; Bartlett, Proc. Zool. Soc 1868, p. 115; David, Proc. 

 Zool. Soc, 1868, p. 210; Gould, B. Asia, VII. 1869, pi. 33 ; Sclater, Proc Zool. Soc, 1869, p. 628 ; Gray, Hand-list 

 Birds, 1 1. 1 870, p. 258 ; Bennett, Wanderings in New South Wales, II. 1834, p. 55 ; David, N. Arch, Mus. Bull., VII. 

 1871, p. II [Pekin, Sze-chuen] ; Elliot, Monog. Phas,, II. 1872, pi. XI. [text]; Garrod, Proc Zool. Soc. 1873, 

 p. 468; Garrod, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1873, p, 640; David and Oustalet, Ois, Chine, 1877, p. 413 [Mts. N. and E. of 

 Pekin and between Shen-se, Honan and Sze-chuen]: Ravensw. Tr. N. Durh., VII. 1878, pt. I. p, 168; Lilford, 

 Proc. Zool. Soc, 1880, p, 421; Goodchild, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1886, p. 193; Creagh, Ibis, 1886, p. 382; Giinther, 

 Proc. Zool. Soc, 1887, p. 503; Styan, Ibis, 1891, pp. 329,499 [Lower Yangtse] ; Grant, Cat. Game-birds Brit. 

 Mus., XXII. 1893, p. 357; Brandis, Jour, fiir Orn., 1896, p. 301 ; Grant, Hand-book Game-birds, II. 1897. p. 37; 

 Tegetmeier Bull. Brit. Orn. Club, VII. 1898, p. xxvii, ; Tegetmeier, Ibis, 1898, p 290; Rothschild, Bull. Brit. 

 Orn. Club, XI. 1901, p. 53 ; Gunther, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1904, pt. I. p. 371 ; Giinther, Proc. Zool. Soc, 1904, pt. II. 

 p. 129; Baturlin, Ibis, 1904, pp. 378,407, 408,413; Tegetmeier, Pheasants, 1904, p. 178; Rothschild, Bull. Brit, 

 Orn. Club, XIV. 1904, pp. 36, ij, 58; Rothschild, Bull. Brit Orn. Club, XXI. 1907, p. 24; Millais, Nat. Hist. Brit. 

 Game-birds, 1909, p. 107; Mitchell, Proc, Zool. Soc, 191 1, p. 521 ; Thayer and Bangs, Mem. Mus. Comp. Zool. 

 Harvard, XL., 1912, p. 143. 



Pkasianus veneratus Temminck, PI. Col. V., 1830, pi. 5 [no. 485] ; Lesson, Traite d'Orn., 1831, p. 496; Jard. 

 Nat. Lib. Orn., IV. 1834, pi. XVI. 



Syrmaticus reevesii \Ndig\QY, Isis, 1832, p. 1229; Swinhoe, Proc. Zool. Soc, 187 1, p. 398; Sharpe, Hand-list 

 Birds, I. 1899, p. 38 ; Heinroth, Zool. Beobachter, 1908, p. 21 ; Beebe, Zoologica, I. No. 15, 1914, p. 278. 



