Letters, Announcements, fyc. 131 
grey, with six irregular transverse bars and a whitish tip, but 
with no tinge of rufous. The under surface is marked very 
much as is represented in f The Ibis'* for 1874, Plate X., but 
with considerably more white on the abdomen, owing to the 
brown streaks being fewer and narrower; the thighs and 
under tail-coverts are also white, with a few streaks of brown, 
varying in both length and breadth. The wings in this spe¬ 
cimen show a remarkable approach to the plumage of the 
adult male : the whole of the lesser wing-coverts are white, 
but with a broad sagittate mark of dark brown in the centre 
of each feather, the same coloration being extended over the 
bend of the carpal joint, and along the anterior edge of the 
wing to the commencement of the greater coverts; the black 
band which, in the adult male, extends from the neighbour¬ 
hood of the carpal joint to the tips of the tertials, is, in this 
specimen, represented by a corresponding band of dark cho¬ 
colate-brown, varied by some of the brown feathers passing, 
in part, into a decided black, and by a few white spots in 
that part of the band which is near to the carpal joint; 
that portion of the wing which is grey in the full-plumaged 
male is also grey in this female, but with transverse bars of 
dark brown as in the ordinary plumage of male specimens of 
intermediate age. 
The principal measurements of this female are as follows— 
wing from carpal joint 15*8, tarsus 33, middle toe s. u. 1*45. 
I am, &c., 
Northrepps, Norwich. J. H. Gurney. 
3rd December, 1875. 
Sir, —In the October number of r The Ibis* for 1875, Or. 
N. Severtzoff, in a paper upon some new Central-Asian birds, 
gives descriptions of three Pheasants, which he calls respec¬ 
tively Phasianus semitorqucitus, Phasianus chrysomelas , and 
Phasianus persicus. 
Of the first of these Or. Severtzoff seems to be undecided 
about the specific distinctness from P. mongolicus. Without 
having seen the specimen, I am of course unable to give any 
decided opinion; but it is not improbable that it may be only a 
