18 INTIIODUCTION. 



to a separate and special end and purpose — an end and a pur- 

 pose which cannot be seen to advantage in any but a comjiara- 

 tively undisturbed country like Australia — a part of the world's 

 surface still in maiden dress, but the charms of which will ere 

 long be ruffled and their true character no longer seen ! Those 

 charms will not long survive the intrusion of the stockholder, 

 the farmer, and the miner, each vying with the other to ob- 

 literate that which is so pleasing to every naturalist ; and for- 

 tunate do I consider the circumstances which induced me to 

 visit the country while so much of it remained in its primitive 

 state. 



I must revert to the Kangaroos ; for it will be necessary to 

 point out the situations affected by the various genera. In the 

 body of the work three species of true Macrujn are figured, 

 and others are described, but not represented. These are all 

 iidiabitants of the southern districts of Australia and Van Die- 

 men's Land. To say that no true Macropus, as the genus is 

 now restricted, would be found in Northern Australia WQuld be 

 somewhat unwarrantable ; at the same time, 1 have never seen an 

 cxamj)le from thence. The genus Osphranter, on the other hand, 

 the members of which, as has been before stated, are always 

 found in rocky situations, have their rej)resentatives in the north 

 as well as in the south, but they are not found in Van Diemen's 

 Land. The splendid O. rufus is an animal of the interior, and 

 frccjucnts the ])lains more than any other s])eeies of its genus. 

 At present, the back settlements of New South Wales, Queens- 

 land, Victoria, and South Australia are the only countries whence 

 1 liavc seen specimens. The great Black Wallaroo (O, robustus) 

 forms its numerous runs among the I'ocks, and on the summits 

 of mountains bordering the I'ivers Mokai and Gwydyr. The O. 

 Parryi ranges over the rocky districts of the headwaters of the 

 Clarence and adjacent rivers, while the 0. antilopinus is as yet 

 only known in the Cobourg Peninsula. 



Tlie smaller Pctroguhe differ from all the other Kangaroos, 

 both in the form of their feet and the structure of their brushy 



