238 AVES— ORDER GALLIFORMES. 



China, and the island of Formosa. In Japan a splendid species is resident, 

 P. versieolar, remarkable for its dark green breast, and in the same country are 

 found tlie copper pheasants (P. scemmerinrji and P. scintillans), birds of a 

 different type altogether from our ordinary pheasant. The finest of all, 

 however, is Beeves' pheasant {Phasianus reevesi), which lives in China, and 

 is remarkable for its white crown and the length of its tail, which, in fully 

 adult birds, attains to the dimensions of five feet ! 



The barred-backed pheasants (Galiophasis) are represented by two species 

 only, G. ellioti, from the mountains of South-Eastern China, and G. humioe, 

 from the Shan States and the Lushai Hills and those of Manipur. 



The best-known species of the genus Chrysolophus is the golden pheasant 



(0. pictus), and the name is commonly used to designate the genus, and is 



perfectly appropriate to the golden pheasant, but is a mis- 



The Caped ngmer for the Lady Amhersts' pheasant, which has no 



pneasan s. golden colour on its neck, but carries a "cape" of white, 

 Chrvsolor)hui barred with steel-blue. The golden pheasant inhabits 

 ' Southern and Western China to Kokonoor, and 0. amherstice 

 replaces it in the mountains of Western China and Eastern Tibet. 



These birds have a special interest, as it is from them that all our breeds 

 of poultry have been derived, although it is difficult to believe that a cochin- 

 china, a dorking, or a Spanish fowl can have originated in 



The Jungle- these spangled, many-coloured denizens of the forests of the 

 Fowl. — Genus East. The nearest approach to the wild stock that domestic 

 Gidlus. variation produces is found in the "Game" fowl, and a 



very interesting group is to be seen in the Natural History 

 Museum of some birds shot wild in the Fiji Islands by Mr. E. L. Layard, 

 C.M.G. In the early voyages in the Pacific by Captain Cook and other 

 navigators, fowls were turned loose on some of the islands, to provide 

 food for any unfortunate sea-faring folk who might be shipwrecked on 

 them. At the present day these birds have taken to their original habits 

 as jungle-fowl, and have to be hunted and shot. They have, moreover, 

 reverted to the plumage of true jungle-fowl, and though the cocks still show 

 traces of a domestic strain, the hens, as well as some of the cock-birds, have 

 assumed once more the coloration of the wild stock from which they were 

 originally derived. The true jungle-fowl are found at the present day in 

 the Indian Peninsula and Ceylon, the Indo-Malayan region to Cochin-Ghina 

 and the island of Hainan, south to the Philippines, Java, Sumatra, Borneo, 

 Celebes, and other islands of the North Moluccas. 



These are birds of grey coloration, but remarkable for the metallic green, 

 purple, or blue spots or " eyes" which adorn their plumage. Five species 



The P k ^^^ known, inhabiting the Himalayan system of mountains 



Pheasants — ^"^""^ Sikkim to Tenasserim and Cochin-China, and thence 

 Genus' through the Malayan Peninsula to Sumatra, Borneo, and the 



Polypectrum. ^^l'™<^ °^ Palawan in the south of the Philippine Archipelago. 

 They are found from the lowlands up to 6,000 feet in Tenas- 

 serim. They seem to affect forest country, feeding on fruit, insects, worms, 

 and small land-shells. The call of P. rhhniitis, the" Himalayan species, is said 

 by Mr. Clark to be something like a laugh— "7ia—7irt,—/i(i— ha." Mr. John 

 Whitehead says that in Palawan he found the species of the island, f. 

 napoleonis, very local, and his specimens were all collected in one district of 

 the forest. It is not known for certain whether the peacock pheasants are 

 polygamous, and ]Mr. ^\'hitehead inclines to the idea that they are not ; hut 



