a g j t f a M s » « f L f v s
PH ASI ANUS DECOLLATUS.
RINGLES® CHINESE PHEASANT.
PHASIANUS DECOLLATUS, Swinh. Proc. Zool. Soc. (1870)p. 135—G. R. Gray, Hand-list Birds, pt. ii. p. 268. no. 9678.
H ab. Chungkingfoo, Szechuen ( S w in h o e ) . Moupin (D avid).-
This Pheasant was first procured by Mr. Swinhoe during a voyage up the river Yangtsze, at a place called Chungkingfoo, in
Szechuen, and also by Père David at Moupin, near the Thibetan borders ; and several living examples were sent by the latter to
the Jardin des Plantes, where they arrived in excellent condition. Mr. Swinhoe’s account of this bird is as follows:— “ On the
13th of May, 1869, the day after our arrival a t Chungkingfoo, in Szechuen, the servant returned from the market with this
Pheasant. He fortunately showed it to me before he handed it to the cook. I was at once struck by the absence of the collar, and
tried to get more specimens, but without success. The natives declared that they had never seen the Pheasant with the white
collar. I consider the want of the collar a very striking peculiarity, as, among the large number of Chinese Pheasants that I
have seen from various parts of China, I have never met a collarless specimen, nor have I ever heard of such a thing. I
have, moreover, been assured by friends a t home that if in a descendant of a cross between P. colchicus and P . torqualus any
mark of the latter remains, it is sure to be accompanied by a white CçfilarS But, independent of the lack of the neck-ring, I
have shown that there are other characters to distinguish the species. It is impossible to presume that our bird could be
a cross between the two mentioned species ; for between the habitats of our new species and the P . colchicus the broadly
collared P . mongolicus has place. . . . . I have a Pheasant from Hankow, 750 miles lower down the river than Chungking. This
agrees with the ordinary P . torquatus in every respect, except that its broad white collar is broken in the front o f . thç nêck,
the two ends of the ring, being three quarters of an inch apart.” The examples procured by Père David differ slightly from
Mr. Swinhoe’s type ; and I have therefore represented the Moupin style o f this Pheasant |jÿ;: the sitting figure in the Plate.
They are undoubtedly of the same race.
Male.-—Head aiid neck similar to those of P. torquatus, but without any light superciliary stripe. Upper part o f back golden yellow,
each feather with a dark green spot in tile centre. Back and wings reddish chestnut, feathers with black centres broken by
a narrow longitudinal white line ; shafts white. Secondaries olive-bro'wn,; edged with chestnut. Shoulders bluish. Rump
greenish in the centre, purplish on the sides. Breast deep red, feathers margined with green. Flanks golden yellow, a dark
blue spot in the centre o f each feather at the tip. Abdomen^ black, separated from the breast and flanks by dark green
feathers. Tail olive-brown, barred narrowly with black and with a broad margin of chestnut for two-thirds the length of the
feathers. Under tail-coverts chestnut, tipped with black. Upper tail-coverts light brown, mottled with dark brown. Bill horn