THE KANGAROO. 29 



But I cannot say that I ever really fancied kangaroo- 

 shooting much as a sport. There is a sameness in it 

 when carried on month after month, which is very 

 wearying, even if followed as an amusement ; and at 

 the present prices a man is not sufficiently remunerated 

 for his trouble if he follows it as a trade. Moreover, 

 there was too much of the carcass-butcher about it to 

 please me, and driving kangaroo is certainly one of the 

 tamest of all field-sports. "When a man is hunting for 

 his daily bread, he is justified in adopting the surest 

 means of procuring it; the sport of the chase now 

 becomes a business, and what would be deemed pot- 

 hunting by the amateur, is looked upon as all fair by 

 the professional shooter, who is perhaps guilty of many 

 a poaching trick to obtain his game, which would be 

 condemned in fair sporting. This, however, I thought 

 nothing of, for I was shooting for my living and not 

 for pleasure; but I never could reconcile to my mind 

 the wholesale and wanton destruction of this animal 

 which is now carried on all over the bush. Whenever I 

 wanted a kangaroo for the body or the skin, I felt no 

 compunction in killing it in whatever manner I best 

 could ; but I never shot one wantonly, and it certainly 

 used to go much against the grain when I saw a 

 kangaroo pulled down by dogs and left to rot in the 

 bush, and old does' shot with a heavy joey in the pouch, 

 which is mercilessly torn out and its brains dashed out 

 against a tree : with the exception of clubbing seals, this 

 certainly did appear to be about the most barbarous 



