9 



LI8RAI 



INTRODUCTION. 



THE "Handlist," here submitted to the public, has been compiled 

 more for the use of students and collectors than for scientists, for 

 whom it contains little that is new or of special interest ; but it 

 is believed that it will prove helpful, to the student in his earlier 

 endeavors to unravel the mysteries of Nature, and to the collector 

 that it may enable him, round his camp fire in the evening, to 

 determine the specimens which he has obtained during the day. 

 There are, howerer, besides the student and the collector, scattered 

 over the length and breadth of these Colonies hundreds of educated 

 men, chiefly of the medical profession, who, with all the thirst for 

 research which the study of that profession necessarily engenders, 

 are unable, except at rare intervals, to consult the numerous 

 works which are now indispensable to its comprehension ; to 

 these also it is hoped that these pages will prove of assistance by 

 bringing, in however imperfect a manner, the history of Australian 

 Mammalogy up to date, and thus supplying a much needed want. 

 To all I trust that the short introductory notice on mammalian 

 Osteology may be of value, but especially to collectors, on whom 

 the author would wish to impress the imperative necessity of 

 conserving the skeletons, even to the very smallest bone those 

 of the wrist and the ankle, and the so-called "marsupial bones" 

 should be specially looked after of all Mammals obtained. 



To all, again and again, I must impress the fact that, however 

 beautiful or strange the outside covering of the body may be, 

 the skeleton is of infinitely more value to science; and not to the 

 mammalogist alone but to everyone who sincerely endeavors to com- 

 prehend the relationship between the various Families, Orders, and 

 Classes of living creatures with which our earth is peopled. 



Since the publication of Mr. Gerard Krefft's "Australian Verte- 

 brata Fossil and Recent," published in the Catalogue Nat. 

 Industrial Prods. N.S. Wales (1877), no work dealing systemati- 

 cally with Australian Mammalogy as a whole has been attempted^ 

 In Mr. KreflVs list 174 recent species are catalogued as against 



