THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 143 



found, however, that with sufficient trouble I can make nearly all 

 specimens beautiful and natural. I have so often been asked by 

 my friends how I managed that I thought a larger public might 

 be glad to have the benefit of my experience." 



[We hope some of our botanical friends will put these hints in 

 practice, and give the results when applied to Australian 

 vegetation. — Ed. Vict. Nat.^ 



Helix aspersa carnivorous. — On a recent showery day I 

 found an average-sized specimen of the introduced Helix aspersa 

 actively engaged in eating an earth worm, which appeared to be 

 dead, as it was quite motionless during the process. The worm, 

 which was about a couple of inches in length, was disappearing 

 into the snail's mouth at a comparatively rapid rate. When 

 eating vegetable matter the snail, by the aid of its horny radula 

 and jaws reduces its food to small fragments before swallowing it. 

 Here, however, nothing of the kind was taking place. The jaws 

 were working vigorously, and at each retraction a further portion 

 of the worm disappeared, it was going down whole. The attack 

 was begun at the head end, and the long projecting body of the 

 worm brought back the memory of the smoking snail in " Alice in 

 Wonderland," only in this case it was a cigar and not a hookah 

 that was being enjoyed. Judging by the thickness of the worm, and 

 the length of the projecting part, I must have arrived at the beginning 

 of the feast, and in less than a couple of minutes all trace of the 

 worm had disappeared. I am not aware whether the carnivorous 

 habit is common in this species of snail, though many others are 

 recorded as habitually living on a mixed diet. The rapid 

 spreading of Helix aspersa and its large numbers show it to be 

 able to assimilate a wide range of food material, and if it has 

 taken to devouring earth worms, in this case also almost certainly 

 an imported form, we have another reason for fighting against the 

 plague, for the harm it does is indirect as well as direct. — T. S. 

 Hall. 



The Common Opossum, 2'richosuriis vulpecula, Ogilby. —Some 

 time ago, while working through a large patch of Kangaroo-apple 

 scrub, Solanu77i vescum, F. v. M., in the Kongwak district, I 

 came upon several holes in the ground like those made by 

 rabbits. As these rodents have not yet, fortunately, reached 

 this part of Gippsland, I was at a loss to know what animal was 

 using them. They were too small for wombats, and foxes in this 

 district don't trouble about making holes in the ground, but 

 simply take possession of hollow or rotten logs, tearing the 

 decayed wood out of the latter. I went on my way pondering 

 over this when a few yards further on I was startled by an animal 

 that suddenly jumped up from under my feet. It turned out to 

 be a large opossum, which had been sleeping at the foot of a 

 large he How dead tree. As soon as it woke up, instead of 



