JCwiMSrJ/.CJMtitrM <t Wv.
ACCENTOR E B .T THROPYfflUS , Swinh
Waker.Jmp.
ACCENTOR ERYTHROPYGIUS, 18
Red-backed Accentor.
Accentor erythropygius, Swinh. Proc. of Zool. Soc., 1870, pp. 124, 447, pi. ix.
alpinus, Schrenck, Yog. des Amur-L. p. 355 ?
It will be seen that in this work neither the subgeneric term Spermolegus, proposed for the Accentor
montanellus, nor Tliarrlialeus, for our common Hedge-Sparrow, has been employed, but that all the birds of this
group have been retained in the genus Accentor, of which the A . alpinus is the ty p e ; it is more immediately
to this latter section that the very fine bird here represented belongs.
O f the history of the Bed-backed Accentor I know nothing more than has been placed on record by
Mr. Swinhoe in the ‘ Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London,’ and in some MS. notes with which
he has favoured me since the former account was published:—
“ On a journey from Mongolia to Peking, in the Prefecture of Seuen-hwafoo, a tract of country enclosed
by two portions of the Great Wall, we halted on the 26th o f September, 1868, a t a place called Kemeih, and
climbed up the sides of a high mountain,*pn the top of which stood a monastery. We were in pursuit of the
Rock-Partridge ('Caccabis chulcar), when ‘a party of red-tailed birds whisked past us and, perching near, kept
flying from rock to rock, uttering loud cries. We secured one, and then continued our chase after the Partridges.
A few days later I saw another small flock of the same species among the rocks of the fine mountain-
pass that leads through the Nankow Gate to the Peking plain. The bird proved to be an Accentor of the
A . alpinus form, most nearly allied to the Accentor nipalensis of Hodgson; but from this the handsome
A . erythropygius may be a t once distinguished by the chestnut colouring o f its rump, upper tail-coverts, and
tail, by its-greyer head and neck, and by the markings of the flanks and belly. Accentor altaicus and
A . alpinus are also members o f the same group of m ottled-throated Accentors.”
“ Pere David,” says Mr. Swinhoe, in the MS. notes above acknowledged,“ does not include this species in
his ‘ Catalogue o f the Birds of Peking; ’ and Gustav Radde did not meet with it in his travels in the southern
parts of Eastern Siberia; but MiddendorfF found a bird which, from his description, is evidently this species
(though identified by him with A . alpinus), in Amoorland, and saw the young in July, flying about in parties
•on the steepest cliffs of the south shore o f the sea o f Okhotsk. Von Schrenck also met with it in Amoorland,
but failed to distinguish it from A . alpinus. It must also breed in the neighbourhood of Lake Baikal; for I
have seen young specimens which M. Jules Verreaux had received thence.
“ The general plumage before the first moult is o f a mottled yellowish g rey ; but the bright cinnamon
colouring of the rump and the margins of the tail-feathers mark at once the species, even at this early age.”
The following is Mr. Swinhoe’s description of this fine b ird :—
“ Head, neek, and breast smoke-grey; lores, and beneath the eye mottled with white; throat, for nearly
an inch downwards white, crossed with narrow bars of black; lesser and greater wing-coverts and winglet
black, with a large spot of white a t the tip of each feather; secondary quills black, margined for the greater
part of their length with yellowish brown, and broadly tipped with light chestnut, terminating with white; on
the tertiaries the chestnut brightens and increases in extent, and the terminal white spots are conspicuous;
primaries blackish brown, edged with light yellowish brown, browner near their bases, and slightly tipped
with wh ite ; back light yellowish brown with broad brown centres to the feathers; scapularies brownish
chestnut, with a median streak of blackish brown and a small white tip to each fea th e r; the yellowish brown
of the back soon brightens into brownish chestnut, which is rich and conspicuous on the upper tail-coverts, the
longest of which have black centres ; tail brownish black, the external rectrix with the greater part of its
outer web brownish chestnut, and a broad white tip to the inner web; the rest of the rectrices, except the
two centrals, have their outer webs tipped with chestnut, their inner webs with white, and they are narrowly
edged with light yellowish brown ; the two centrals are more broadly edged, and have broad chestnut marks
on both their outer and inner webs towards the tip s ; axillaries dusky, the carpal edge barred with black
and white like the th ro a t; under surface light yellowish brown ; many of the flank-feathers deep chestnut-
brown, with white margins; and the abdominal feathers have blackish Y-shaped bars and white margins ;
under tail-coverts blackish chestnut, with broad white margins and tip s ; bill blackish brown, ochreous yellow
on the sides of the basal half of the lower mandible ; irides chestnut; legs and toes ochreous ; claws light
brown.”
The figures are of the natural size.