68 LLOYD'S NATURAL HISTORY. 
Characters. —Fur soft, close, and thick. General colour griz- 
zled grey; under-parts white ; sometimes an indistinct white 
hip-mark. Legs white; feet white or pale brown, with long 
bristly hairs nearly concealing the claws ; tail coloured above 
like the back, the upper hairs not forming a distinct crest, 
below pale brown or white, with the tip white. Length of 
head and body about 18 inches; of tail 12 inches. 
Distribution.—South and West Australia. 
Habits.—Writing more than thirty years ago, Krefft ob- 
serves: ‘This burrowing species has long retreated before the 
herds of cattle with which the plains bordering on the Murray 
are now stocked, and it is no longer to be found south of that 
river,—so, at least, the natives assure me,—and whenever we 
went out hunting for it, we always had to cross to the New 
South Wales side. 
“Tt is a truly nocturnal animal, which always leaves its bur- 
row long after the sun is down, in fact, never before it is quite 
dark. I often watched near their holes, gun in hand, listening to 
their peculiar call ; but I always had great difficulty in procuring 
specimens, as they were very shy, and hardly to be distinguished 
from the surrounding objects. The best plan is always to dig 
them out, an operation in which the black-fellows are very ex- 
pert, though it is rather tedious work, as the holes run into 
each other, and, being sometimes ten feet deep, several ; 
shafts have to be sunk, before a couple of ‘ Boomings,’ as the 
animals are called by the natives of the Murray district, can } 
be secured.” 
Although but a single offspring is produced at a birth, the 
writer quoted believes that this species, and probably also its 
allies, breed several times during the year. 
In captivity these Rat-Kangaroos are wild and intractable, 
