Genus MACROPYGIA. 



The genus Macropygia is included by Salvadori in his family 

 Columbidae, but, together with three other genera, is placed in a sub- 

 family, Macropygiinae, whilst Blanford retains it with the Wood- and 

 Rock-Pigeons and the true Doves in his Columbinae. It is a very well- 

 marked genus, with a long tail exceeding the wing in length and having 

 the feathers very much graduated, in both these respects differing 

 from all our other genera of this subfamily. The bill is small and weak, 

 the tarsus short and feathered for the greater part of its length, the 

 toes long, and the soles broadened. The feathers of the rump are 

 spinous, and the tail-coverts elongated. 



One of the most remarkable features in the plumage of this genus, 

 in so far as it is found within Indian Umits, is in regard to the barring 

 found on the plumage of the adult male or female. Thus, in one species, 

 tusalia, the lower plumage is barred throughout in the adult female 

 and not at all in the male, whereas in the next species, rufipennis, the 

 male bird is barred and the fuUy adult female is entirely without barring 

 on the lower-plumage ; and yet again in the third species, ruficeps, there 

 is no barring on the breasts of either sex when adult, but the breast 

 is mottled with black in the female and with white in the male. 



As it is to be presumed that all these thi'ee species have descended 

 from one ancestor, it is interesting to try to work out which is the primi- 

 tive type of plumage, and if, as would probably be held to be the case, 

 the barred plumage is the earUest type of colouring, why has this per- 

 sisted in the male in one species, in the female in another, whilst it has 

 practically disappeared in a third ? 



In the Ibis for April, 1890, Wardlaw Ramsay dealt at some length 

 with the genus Macropygia, in which he recognized twenty-six species, 

 including the above three species, but not including assimilis. The 

 questions of differentiation in sex he considers, in this article, very care- 

 fully, and it will be seen that on the whole I agree with the conclusions 

 at which he arrives, but that I do not consider the males and females 

 of rufipennis are entirely aUke when fully adult. 



Although Wardlaw Ramsay does not divide assimilis from ruficeps, 

 he appears to consider that the Tenasserim bird is larger than the latter 

 and should be divided, but I have gone very carefully into the question 

 and cannot agree with him on this point. 



