GENERAL AND INTRODUCTORY. 21 



much elongated contour of the snouts, they bear a not inconsiderable resemblance 

 to the shrews and certain other members of the higher mammalian order of the 

 Insectivora. The Australian badgers or wombats, genus Phascolomys, with their 

 thick-set bodies, short legs, and plantigrade gait, are commonly likened to members of 

 the bear family. Associated with this purely superficial resemblance they possess chisel- 

 like incisor teeth and other internal characteristics which more nearly approximate 

 them to the beaver and other of the larger rodents. It is of interest to note that 

 the remains of an extinct species of wombat, which must have equalled the tapir in 

 size, were discovered some time since in the pleistocene deposits of Queensland, and 

 were correlated by Professor Sir Richard Owen with the distinctive title of Phascolonus 

 gigas. Various species of wombats still exist both in Tasmania and throughout the 

 Australian mainland. 



The general features of the extensive family of the kangaroos, Macropodidse, 

 will be too familiar to need descriptive detail. In addition to the kangaroos, it 

 embraces the wallabies, wallaroos, kangaroo rats, and other allied types, varying in 

 dimensions from the big " boomer " or " old man " kangaroo, which will over-top a 

 man when standing erect on its hind feet, to diminutive forms which, as their name 

 implies, are not larger than ordinary rats. All the Macropodidoe are distinguished 

 by the preponderating length of their hinder limbs, upon which alone they progress 

 under any stimulus to rapid movement by a characteristic series of leaps and bounds. 

 Being essentially vegetarian in their habits, the larger species of the kangaroo family, 

 where abundant, so seriously tax the resources of the Australian pasture lands as to 

 necessitate the adoption of stringent measures to keep them in check. This untoward 

 necessity, combined with the high value set upon kangaroo skins, has contributed towards 

 the complete extirpation of the "Boomer" throughout a large extent of the prairie- 

 like tracts of Australian pastoral land on which it abounded previous to the advent 

 of the settler. 



The most remarkable members of this family group are undoubtedly the Tree 

 Kangaroos, belonging to the genus Dendrolagus, which to the form of the ordinary 

 terrestrial species unite the tree-frequenting habits of the opossums or phalangers. To 

 the three species of this genus originally reported from New Guinea, two additional 

 ones Dendrolagus Lumholtzi and D. Bennetianm their native name " Boongarry," 

 have been recently discovered in North Queensland. 



The transition from the Tree Kangaroos to the essentially arborescent 

 Australian Opossums or Phalangers, PhalungeridsB, would seem, at first sight, to be 



