i6o A MONOGRAPH OF THE PHEASANTS 



the shaft is entirely bare, while beyond this point the web, both outer and inner, is 

 broken by bare patches and is generally mussed and wrinkled for often half the entire 

 length of the feather. The frequent bending or breaking of the barbs midway of their 

 length is explained by the occurrence of numerous fault-bars on these outer feathers. 

 The tips of the longest tail-feathers — the sixth and seventh from the outer pairs — are 

 frequently themselves bent or broken, and all the shaft tips are soiled and unsightly. 

 Not only are the shafts of the outer rectrices exceedingly thick and strong, but they 

 have actually downward curving tips — almost woodpecker-like — curving in the direction 

 from which the friction and attrition against the ground and leaves must come. From 

 the sixth pair inward this character is wholly lacking. 



When the scattering of barbs left here and there in the heart of the denuded area 

 is examined, the congenital weakness is plainly evident. It is a constricting or rather 

 flattening of the extreme base of the barbs, together with the loss of all the barbules at 

 that point. In every way it is directly comparable with the corresponding phenomenon 

 in the freshly-grown central rectrices of the motmot. 



There seems to be some grounds for supposing that in these pheasants the absence 

 of pigment in the tail-feathers is at least indirectly correlated with the downy character, 

 and perhaps a tendency to basal weakness of the barbs, for in many specimens of the 

 Malayan crested fireback the central rectrices show a very similar denudation of 

 the shaft, not extending beyond the white area which includes the entire webs of the 

 two central pairs and the inner web of the third. 



Even in the chestnut rectrices of the second-year male White-tail, the phenomenon 

 is foreshadowed, the outer webs of the outer one or two pairs of rectrices sometimes 

 showing considerable denudation, while the tips of several of the feathers may be bent 

 or broken. 



In the tail of the adult male White-tail, the seven external pairs of rectrices seem 

 to be much more intimately connected with the complicated caudal musculature than 

 the succeeding inner ones, the relation being especially close with the depressing 

 muscles. So it seems certain that this structure is connected with the greater wear 

 and tear which the congenitally weakened webs of these feathers invariably show, 

 causing them to be more active in the downward and somewhat outward spreading 

 which is a feature apparently of both challenge and courtship. 



Face and bare skin of the side crown bright purplish-blue, duller on the wrinkled 

 retracted wattles. Skin of chin, visible through the scanty feathering, back to the 

 base of the gape, pink. The two anterior pairs of wattles are pointed ; those on each 

 side of the occiput are bifurcated, this terminal area being distinctly dark in colour and 

 of a wholly different structure from the rest of the wattle. The wattle as a whole 

 consists of transverse bands of smooth blue skin, which wrinkles closely together. 

 The bifurcated black tip is covered thickly with small and irregular papillae. The 

 irides are very deep, strong carmine ; legs and feet carmine, less intense than the 

 eyes. 



Mandibles black except distal half of lower and the tip of the upper mandible, 

 which are pale horn colour. Weight of an adult male 2| to 3^ lbs. Length, 790 mm. ; 

 bill from nostril, 21 ; wing, 260; tail, 460; tarsus, 92; middle toe and claw, 63. The 

 spurs of this pheasant are comparatively short and weak, but exceedingly variable in 



