358 



The Living Animals of the World 



the admiration of its own image in the glass had some share in compassing its untimely end. 

 Possibly, however, it hailed in the reflection the welcome advent of a companion to share its 

 lone banishment from the land of the gum-tree, and in its efforts to greet it thus came 

 to grief. 



The female koala produces but one cub at a time. At an early period after its birth 

 this is transferred to its mother's back, and is thus transported until its dimensions are 

 about one-half of those of its parent. The pair as shown in the illustration on page 355 

 presents, under these conditions, an essentially grotesque aspect. 



It is a noteworthy circumstance that, compared with the male, the female koala is but 

 rarely to be observed wandering abroad during broad daylight. As with the typical phalangers, 

 food is consumed chiefly at night or during the brief Australian twilight hours. While the 

 male at certain periods, more especially the months of March and April, is much in evidence 

 in daytime to both the senses of sight and hearing, as attested to on a previous page, the 

 female spends the whole or greater portion of the day clinging as an inert sleeping mass to a 

 -convenient branch. " Bear "-shooting in Australia, as might be anticipated from the description 

 here given of the animal's habits and temperament, affords but sorry sport. It may further 

 be remarked that those who have shot at and only disabled one of these inoffensive little 

 creatures are scarcely likely to repeat the experiment. The cry of a wounded koala has been 

 aptly compared to that of a distressed child, but still more pathetic. When fatally shot, it 

 also more frequently than otherwise clings tenaciously back-downwards, like the South American 

 sloths, to the supporting . tree-branch, and is thus frequently irrecoverable. With the non- 

 sentimental Australian furrier the koala's pelt of soft, crisp, ashy-grey fur is unfortunately in 

 considerable demand, being made up mostly, with the quaint round head and tufted ears 

 intact, into, it must be confessed, singularly attractive and warm rugs. 



The correspondence of the koala in form and habits to the sloths among the higher 

 mammalia has been previously mentioned. The parrallelism might be pursued in yet another 

 direction. In earlier times the small tree-inhabiting South American sloths were supplemented 



by ground -frequenting species, such as the 

 Megatherium, which were of comparatively titanic 

 proportions. The epoch of the accredited exist- 

 ence of these huge ground- sloths was so com- 

 paratively recent the later tertiaries that it is 

 even yet not regarded as altogether improbable 

 that some existing representative of the race 

 may yet be discovered in the fastnesses of the 

 South American forests, and thus claim a niche 

 in the pages of a subsequent edition of 

 "LIVING ANIMALS." In a like manner the little 

 sloth-like tree-frequenting " Australian Bear " 

 had his primeval ground-dwelling colossi, and 

 there is yet a lurking hope among enthusiastic 

 zoologists that some surviving scion of the little 

 koala's doughty forebears may yet turn up in 

 the practically unexplored Central Australian 

 wildernesses. Some such anticipations, as a 

 matter of fact, stimulated the hopes and aspira- 

 tions of the participators in one of the latest 

 of these exploring expeditions, which, while not 

 successful in this instance in obtaining so great 



Photo by w.saviiie.Kent,F.z.s.] [Miford-on-sea. a prize, secured for science that most interesting 



SQUIRREL-LIKE FLYiNG-pnALANGER OP VICTORIA. and previously unknown marsupial mammal the 



This animal has soft grey fur like that of the chinchilla. Pouched Mole. 



