HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP, 



29 



ment, and is not at all impatient of either cold or 

 damp. 



The Tasmanian jerboa {Beftoitgia ctmiciibis) is 

 only found, as its name implies, in Van Diemen's 

 Land ; it is a small animal of about two feet in length, 

 of a brownish-grey colour, and inhabits open, sandy 

 or stony plains. 



Tlie foregoing are a few of the more remarkable 

 species, belonging to the family of the Macropinre, 

 that are at present to be met with in Australia ; 

 which, however, in common with all other parts of 

 the globe, presents indications of having been, in 

 former times, inhabited by kindred races, far sur- 

 passing in size and strength the comparatively di- 

 minutive creatures that in this degenerate age 

 roam through its primeval woods, or across its 

 boundless and scantily herbaged plains. • 



For instance, the 

 gigantic marsupial 

 described by Owen, 

 in his " P alseon- 

 t ology," from a 

 single tooth, and 

 named by him Di- 

 protodoii, rivalled in 

 size the colossal sloth 

 {Mega t Ji eriuDi) ot 

 Southern America, 

 with which it was 

 contemporary, and 

 was kept in check 

 by carnivorous 

 animals, represented 

 in the present day 

 by the Thylaciiies 

 and Dasyurcs of Tas- 

 mania, one species 

 of which at least, 

 to use the words of 

 Professor Owen, 

 "had carnassial 

 teeth two inches 

 three lines in longitudinal extent, 

 twice the size of a lion" ! 



But these monsters have, happily, passed avi^ay for 

 ever, and their place been taken by the existing races, 

 which we have no reason to believe were, at any 

 time, co-existing with them ; but these, too, are 

 surely, if slowly, disappearing from their native 

 haunts ; and although their place is no longer 

 usurped by new creations, man and his various 

 breeds of domesticated animals, the horse, ox, sheep 

 and rabbit, especially the latter, are as certainly 

 driving them from the scene they have so long 

 occupied, as the terrible cataclysms of the older 

 world removed their more formidable prede- 

 cessors. 



Owing to the vast extent of continental Australia, 

 this exterminative process will be necessarily slow ; 



Fig. 20. — Dog-headed Thylacinus [Thylacinns cynocephalus]. 



was 



fully 



yet when we hear of three thousand kangaroos being 

 clubbed en masse, in one hatttie, and left to rot upon 

 the ground, because, forsooth, they ate a portion of 

 the grass a "squatter" called his, we cannot doubt 

 the ultimate result. 



Even now, within the memory of the older colo- 

 nists, these beautiful and harmless, not to say useful, 

 creatures, which, as well as the emus and opossums, 

 were a few years ago most abundant in those locali- 

 ties, have become comparatively scarce, in some places 

 they have altogether disappeared, within the settled 

 districts ; so much so, that the appearance of one 

 of them, on Keilor Plains for instance, would 

 certainly create as great an excitement there 

 among the farmers, as if the same animal were 

 to be suddenly discovered feeding on Salisbury 

 Plains, or the Curragh of Kildare. 



Is there no way, 

 it may be asked, of 

 putting a stop to this 

 wholesale destruc- 

 tion of a curious and 

 beautiful animal, 

 without doubt 

 created by the Sove- 

 reign Ruler of the 

 universe for some 

 wise, if unfathom- 

 able purpose ? 



I scarcely know ; 

 legislative enact- 

 ments, I fear, would 

 prove but of slight 

 avail; and, most 

 probably, would not 

 be had recourse to, 

 in " a free country," 

 until too late. Much 

 might, doubtless, be 

 effected by the vari- 

 ous acclimatisation 

 societies of Europe 

 and America, to postpone the inevitable hour of 

 extinction ; but it is unlikely, and, indeed, scarcely 

 desirable, that the kangaroo should ever be multiplied 

 to any great extent out of its native land ; for, 

 although its skin makes admirable leather, and its 

 tail delicious soup, we have indigenous animals of 

 our own which equal or surpass it, in the first, if not 

 altogether in the last respect : and although the flesh 

 of the young kangaroo, or joey, is reckoned tender 

 and good, and is even compared by some enthusiasts 

 with venison, it is not probable that it will ever tickle 

 the public palate to such an extent as to supersede 

 mutton in the market : accordingly, unless such a 

 phenomenon should take place, there would be 

 but slender chance of the Macropidce ever increasing 

 in this country in sufficient numbers to insure them 

 from ultimate extinction. 



