108 president's ADDRE8S SECTION D. 



mania the typical form of the great kangaroo on the main- 

 land. It is as large as, or larger than, the latter, with fur 

 much longer, darker and coarser. The other two species of 

 Macropus belong to the group of large and small wallabies 

 respectively. The former is represented in Tasmania by one 

 form, M.rufficoUisvar. bennettii, which is merely the cHmatic 

 variety of the type species found on the continent in South 

 Victoria and New South Wales. M. hillardieri represents 

 the smaller wallabies and is apparently identical with the 

 form prevalent in S. and S. W. Victoria, and the south- 

 eastern parts of South Australia. 



The genus Petrogale, including the rock wallabies, is 

 distributed over the whole of Australia, but does not occur 

 in Tasmania ; and the same is true of Lagorchestes, the hare- 

 wallabies. 



Bettongia has one species (B. cuniculusj, the Tasmanian 

 jerboa kangaroo, common to South Victoria and Tasmania. 

 In Mr. Oldfield Thomas' list this is stated to be a Tasmanian 

 species only but in the Melbourne Museum there is a 

 specimen from the Upper Yarra district. The genus Potorus 

 ( HypsiprymnusJ is represented in Tasmania by P. tri- 

 dactylus, the common rat kangaroo. This form is widely 

 distributed, occurring in Tasmania, Victoria, New South 

 Wales and South Australia. There are considerable varia- 

 tions in size and in Tasmania there appear to be two forms, 

 one larger than those of the mainland and another dwarf 

 form described formerly as a distinct species CP. rufusj. 



Dromicia is a small but interesting genus comprising the 

 dormice-phalangers. Thomas gives two species as peculiar to 

 Tasmania, D. lepida and J), nana, and the range of the 

 genus as New Guinea, W. Australia and Tasmania. He 

 says : — " This genus is evidently intermediate between 

 Acrobates (pigmy flying phalanger) and Petaurus (the 

 ordinary flying phalanger), and has apparently had to give 

 way to these more highly specialized and, presumably, later 

 forms, wherever the two have come in contact. Of this the 

 distribution of the genus is a curious example, since it is 

 isolated in the three regions must curious for their retention 

 of ancient forms — New Guinea, W. Austraha, and Tas- 

 mania — while no species appears to live now in the temperate 

 parts of Eastern Australia, where the most highly-developed 

 genera above referred to have their home, and where, judging 

 by its present distribution, Dromicia must once have existed." 

 It appears, however, that the second species fD. nanaj 



