36 



HA RD WICKE'S SCIENCE - G OSS IP. 



side, the appearance of the central spine, the 

 external margins forming the other two. The 

 internal curved line is the fold of the lateral plate 

 (Fig. 21), forming the opening between the two 

 cavities, not being an opening in the dorsal plate. 

 If this view be correct, it would make this rotifer a 

 Euchlanis. Internally a chain of glands extends 

 along the course of the lateral canals. 



Note on Philodina tuberculata. — Since writing 

 the description of this rotifer, the supplement to 

 Dr. Hudson's work has appeared, and in this he 

 refers this species to P. macrostyla, certainly a more 

 appropriate name, Mr. Gosse himself in a note on this 

 species having stated that there were no tubercles on 

 it. Dr. Hudson also describes four toes. I confess 

 I have never seen a central toe like the one engraved 

 in the November part of Science-Gossip. I must 

 have put it in as seen in my mind's eye, being evolved 

 from Mr. Gosse's dictum that " all the known British 

 species (of the Bdelloida) have three toes." In Mr. 

 Gosse's figure of Philodina roseola, there is also an 

 appearance of four toes. I am looking out for this 

 rotifer to clear up the point. I suggested the appear- 

 ance of four toes was due to the sucker spreading 

 out 'laterally, as the two outside toes in Philodina 

 tuberculata vary in size, sometimes being large, at 

 other times almost disappearing ; when the toes are 

 stretched out to their utmost extent, four toes are 

 distinctly visible, and no alteration of focus will show 

 the toe in the background, that I believed in. The 

 toe itself is a small matter ; its importance is that it 

 spoils the classification, and forms an exception to 

 an order. Nevertheless, facts are stubborn things ; 

 and if the four toes are there, we must accept them. 



Beechwood, Upper Tooting. 



NOTES ON THE NATURAL HISTORY OF 



QUEENSLAND. 



No. 2. 



IN the first portion of my son's Queensland observa- 

 tions a few points were accidentally omitted. 



Thus the so-called " kite " is a recent introduction 

 in Queensland, probably from the south of Asia. Old 

 stockmen and shepherds remember that it was for- 

 merly unknown, though they cannot fix the precise 

 date of its appearance. In South Australia and 

 Victoria it is still very rare, or altogether wanting. 



The fact that the wild cockatoos, when plundering 

 a cornfield, post sentinels to give an alarm, is no 

 longer questioned. But it is curious that if one bird 

 is shot, the others, instead of at once taking flight, 

 hover screaming over their dead companion until 

 many of them share his fate. 



The so-called " laughing jackass" is not, as many 

 people think, merely the low comedian of bird-life ; 

 he is exceedingly useful as a destroyer of death- 

 snakes, almost equal to the secretary-hawk of South 



Africa. His mode of warfare is peculiar ; he seizes 

 the snake by the neck and soars straight up into the 

 air to a considerable height. He then lets his enemy 

 fall, and instantly returning to earth, seizes hinit 

 again, and repeats this manoeuvre until the serpent 

 is too much injured to offer any further resistance, 

 A few pecks on the head ensure his death, when, of 

 course, he is duly eaten. The utility of the laughing 

 jackass is so fully known that the legislature ©6 

 Queensland has imposedfa penalty of ,£io on killing 

 one of these useful birds. 



The bower-birds are not rare. When, as it some- 

 times happens, a community of eight or ten live 

 together, the "bower" is very large and highly 

 ornamented. Sometimes' a number of shells are laid 

 at regular intervals, either in a straight or a serpentine- 

 line. 



The eggs of the emu are generally described as 

 being dark green, but they vary considerably, some 

 being almost black and some of a greenish grey. 



The king- fishers are numerous and beautiful, but 

 their diet seems to consist more of small lizards than 

 offish. Indeed, the rivers of Queensland are gener- 

 ally so turbid, that a king-fisher, sitting on an over- 

 hanging tree, will have little chance of espying a fish, 

 until it actually rises to the surface. 



The mammalia of Queensland present little upon 

 which anything can be here remarked. Sometimes- 

 there occurs, as in all the colonies, an invasion of 

 rats, which seem to come from the desert tracts in the 

 far interior and which do great damage. What they 

 subsist upon in the deserts, and what leads them at 

 times to a general exodus, are points which remain 

 to be ascertained. 



The marsupials of Queensland are substantially the 

 same as those of the rest of Australia. 



The reptiles, on the other hand, are numerous and 

 important. Crocodiles, erroneously called alligators 

 by the settlers, are met with in the larger streams 

 and pools, and reach the length of sixteen to eighteen 

 feet. Hence caution is needed in fording or bathings 

 especially when the water is very muddy. In the 

 extreme north, crocodiles are said to be met with. 

 exceeding thirty feet in length. 



The mysterious bunyip, said of the "black- 

 fellows" to haunt the interior lakes of Australia, is- 

 still an unsolved problem. The descriptions given 

 by alleged eye-witnesses negative the possibility of 

 its being a crocodile. Perhaps the most reasonable 

 supposition is that it is a seal. Several years ago a- 

 paragraph went the round of the papers, English as 

 well as Colonial, that a monstrous saurian, resem- 

 bling some of the extinct species, had been killed in 

 a Queensland river, after a combat in which two 

 black-fellows had been killed. The specimen, it 

 was said, was on its way to London ; but as it 

 has not yet arrived, the whole story was probably 

 an invention. 



The iguana reaches the length of four feet or evea 



