110 THE GREY PEACOCK-PHEASANT. 



hen P. tibetanum, when it was observed that they always kept 

 in the same manner close behind the mother, who held her 

 tail widely spread, thus completely covering them ; and there 

 they continually remained out of sight, only running forward 

 when called by the hen to pick up some food she had found, 

 and then immediately retreating to their shelter. 



The FOLLOWING are the dimensions and colours of the soft parts 

 recorded in the flesh from two fine adult males and females : — 



Males. — Length, 24 # 5 to 26"0 ; expanse, 25*25 to 27*0; tail 

 from vent, 12*6 to 14*2 ; wing, 8'2 to 8'6 ; tarsus, 2*9 to 3*0 ; bill 

 from gape, 1*3 to 1*4. Weight, 1*5 to i*75lbs. 



Females. — Length, 19*0; expanse, 22-5 to 23*6; tail, 8*3; 

 wing, 7*i to ?'6; tarsus, 2*5 to 275; bill from gape, 1-25. 

 Weight, 140ZS. to 1 lb. 



In one male the legs and feet were blackish ; the claws black ; 

 upper mandible and tip of lower mandible black ; rest of lower 

 mandible and facial skin pale fleshy yellow ; irides white. The 

 females had the legs and feet very dark plumbeous ; upper mandi- 

 ble dark horny brown, paler on cere ; lower mandible pale 

 brown ; irides deep grey ; facial skin pale dingy fleshy yellow. 



The Plate gives a fair idea of the male, but it seems neces- 

 sary to give a description of the other sex, the diminutive 

 portrait of which might stand for any thing, and is more like 

 the Malayan Peacock-Pheasant than the present species. 



The female is a much smaller bird than the male, and has less of 

 a brush crest ; the chin and throat greyish white ; the whole of 

 the rest of the head and neck all round rather dark brown, very 

 finely and obsoletely barred with a lighter and more fulvous shade 

 of brown, and decidedly shaded greyer on the forehead and crown; 

 many or most of the feathers of the lower half of the neck, 

 especially in the front and at the sides, with minute white shaft 

 specks or spots ; the primaries and their greater coverts plain 

 glossy rather pale brown, of a peculiar tinge, approaching some- 

 what to liver brown ; the whole of the rest of the visible por- 

 tions of the closed wings and scapulars, and interscapulary re- 

 gion, hair brown ; the feathers with somewhat widely separated 

 irregular narrow speckly transverse bars of pale buff, in places 

 ferruginous buff; the feathers are margined at the tips with a 

 similar band of somewhat coalescing speckles and spots which 

 are white, or nearly so, in most specimens ; inside this the tip of 

 the feather is black or blackish, with, in many cases, a faint dull 

 purplish gloss in parts. This again is bounded above by an 

 imperfect transverse speckly bar, which, like that of the tip, is 

 white or nearly so. The rest of the back, rump, and upper tail- 

 coverts brown, excessively minutely pencilled and stippled with 

 bufTy brown ; most of the feathers more or less white shafted 



