BLACK-BACKED KALEEGE 41 



shaft, and with the framing of reddish, presents a decidedly occellated appearance. 

 On all the wing-coverts the black becomes very broad, distinct and unbroken, and 

 the feather is terminated by an almost equally wide and very conspicuous band of 

 pale creamy buff. 



The secondaries are uniformly vermiculated with reddish brown and black on 

 the exposed parts of the webs, while the primaries have only a very narrow edging 

 of the buff markings. The lower back and rump are almost unmarked. The central 

 pair of tail-feathers are mottled and vermiculated equally with black and a richer 

 chestnut than is found elsewhere on the plumage. The lateral rectrices are irregularly 

 and sparingly mottled with reddish brown. 



In a female a week younger than the juvenile male described, the pale facial 

 down is still present, so the reddish colour of the facial skin of the female at this 

 age is not so apparent as in the other individual. The chin and throat are pure 

 white, the ear-coverts and throat band grey. The lower plumage of buffy brown, 

 indistinctly and faintly mottled with darker, begins abruptly at the grey of the neck, 

 paling to a buffy white on the belly and abdomen, and becoming an indefinite dark 

 brown on the sides and flanks. Fleshy tints as in male. 



Bill from nostril, 11 mm.; length, 300 ; wing, 150; tail, no; tarsus, 40 ; middle 

 * toe and claw, 35. 



Blyth's type of a quarter-grown female, in the Indian Museum, shows almost as 

 extreme fading as does the adult female type, being of a pale reddish brown, paler 

 even than any fresh individual albocristatus which I have seen. 



First Year Plumage. — In the male of melanonotMs, as in the other kaleege, 

 the bird may or may not bear traces of its immaturity throughout its first year of 

 life, in the form of greyish vermiculations on the coverts, secondaries and central 

 tail-feathers. In the juvenile plumage there is no hint of the ultimate lanceolate 

 form of the breast feathers, and the incoming plumage, if acquired early, is pre- 

 dominately dark, and not nearly so narrow and tapering as the succeeding plumage 

 of the second annual moult will be. 



EARLY HISTORY 



In the ** General History of Birds," Dr. John Latham in 1823 described a bird, 

 calling it the Chittygong pheasant. His summary of knowledge of the bird occupied 

 two lines : " Inhabits India ; is a native of the Chittygong Hills, and known by the 

 name of Muthurau." Gray in 1829 calls the bird Phasianus muthura, while in his 

 ''Genera of Birds" Gray gives the genus as Gallophasis. It is doubtful whether this 

 species is indicated, especially as it was said to be ''the size of a turkey." So the name 

 melanotus, given by Blyth in 1848 to what was undoubtedly this form, is usually 

 accepted as the earliest authentic name. It was 1857 before the first living specimens 

 were received at the London Zoo. 



SYNONYMY 



? Chittygong Pheasant Latham, Gen. Hist. VIII. 1823, p. 200. 

 ? Phasianus muthura Gray, in Griff, ed. Cuv. III. 1829, p. 27. 

 ? Gallophasis muthura Gray, Gen. B. III. 1845, p. 498. 

 VOL. n G 



