110 president's address — SECTION D. 



Divide and one in Western Victoria. All these are common 

 to S. Australia. Two only of the 7 are found south of the 

 Divide and of these, one ( Perameles nasuta) is not found 

 north of the Divide, passses up the East Coast into New 

 South Wales, but is absent from S. Australia, and one 

 (Phascologale penicillata) is found both north and south of 

 the Divide and passes into South and West Australia, and 

 northwards so far as Queensland. 



Taking the Polyprotodont fauna of Tasmania and Victoria 

 as a whole, we find that the former is allied to that of the 

 southern division of the latter, whilst there is a distinct 

 alliance between that of Victoria north of the Divide and 

 that of S. AustraUa. 



The forms of chief interest and importance are the 

 following : — 



The family Peraraelidae contains 3 genera of which 2 are 

 not represented in Tasmania ; one, Peragale, is confined to 

 S. and W. Australia and the other, Choeropus, contains 

 only one genus and species f C. castanotiisj, the pig-footed 

 bandicoot, which is completely absent from the east and 

 south-east costal region and hence from Tasmania. It 

 ranges west of the Divide in New South Wales, north of the 

 Divide in Victoria and then passes west into S. Australia and 

 W. Australia. The genus Perameles, including the bandi- 

 coots, is represented in Tasmania by 2 species, one fP. 

 obesulaj widely distributed on the mainland, the other ( J\ 

 gnnni) confined to Tasmania and Victoria. 



The family Dasyuridee contains 3 of the most interesting 

 of marsupial forms and, to quote the words of Oldfield 

 Thomas, " as a whole presents one of the most generahzed 

 types found amongst the marsupials, its members being 

 simply predaceous animals in no way markedly specialized 

 and retaining, especially in the case of Mynuecobius, many 

 of the characteristics of the earliest known marsupials." 

 The genus Thylacinus has only one species ( T. cynocephalus), 

 the "Tasmanian wolf," of which, however, fossil remains 

 have been found in New South Wales and Victoria, 



Sarcophilus, again, has one species (S. iirsinns), the 

 " Tasmanian Devil," now confined to the island, though its 

 fossil remains, like those of the Thylacine, are found on the 

 mainland. The genus Dasyurus, including the destructive 

 dasyures or " native cats," is widely distributed thi-oughout 

 the continent and has 2 species represented in Tasmania, of 

 which both are common to Victoria. Here, again, we have 



