372 



The Living Animals of the World 



r * 



I'/ioto by A. S. Jtudland ifc Sons. 



POUCHED MOLE. 



This animal is of a pale golden-red colour, and about 5 inches long. It spends most of its 

 time burrowing, which it can do with great rapidity, in the sand of the Australian deserts in 

 search of insects. 







Photo by W. Saville-Kent, F.Z.S., MdJord-on-Sea. 

 UNDER SURFACE OP POUCHED MOLE. 

 Notice the abnormal size of the third and fourth 

 toes of the fore limbs, and their peculiar scoop-Jike 

 tape. 



The colour of the pouched 

 mole is for the most part 

 light fawn, varying in parts 

 to golden yellow. One of 

 its most conspicuous features, 

 as illustrated in the accom- 

 panying photographs, is the 

 abnormal size of the third 

 and fourth toes of the fore 

 limbs, their peculiar scoop-like 

 character proving of eminent 

 service to the animal in 

 its customary sand-burrowing 

 habits. 



THE TASMANIAN WOLF. 



The remaining family of 

 the Australian marsupials 

 constitutes a parallel to the 

 carnivorous order of the higher 

 mammalia, all its members 

 being more or less flesh- 

 eaters, and having their 

 dentition modified with relation to such habits. One 

 of these (the TASMANIAN WOLF, or TIGER of the colonists, 

 better known to zoologists as the THYLACINE) is an animal 

 of considerable size. Its dimensions equal those of a wolf 

 or mastiff, with which the contour of its body and more 

 especially that of the head very nearly correspond. In 

 common with the true dogs, the thylacine hunts its 

 prey by scent. This is well attested to by the following 

 incident, as related by eye-witnesses. While camping out 

 among the hills in Tasmania their attention was attracted 

 very early one morning by a brush-kangaroo hopping past 

 their fire in an evidently highly excited state. Some ten 

 minutes later up cantered a she thylacine with her nose 

 down exactly on the track, evidently following the scent, and 

 in another quarter of an hour her two cubs came by also 

 in the precise track. While not very swift, the Tasmanian 

 " tigers " possess immense staying power, and will keep up 

 a long, steady canter for many hours on end. Accustomed 

 in its primitive state to run down and prey upon the 

 kangaroos, wallabies, and other weaker marsupial mammals 

 indigenous to the regions it inhabits, the Tasmanian wolf 

 speedily acquired a predilection for the imported flocks of 

 the settlers, and proved almost as destructive to them as 

 its Old World namesake. To check its ravages, a price 

 was put upon its head by the Tasmanian Government; 

 and this measure, in conjunction with the rapid advances 

 towards the complete settlement of the country which 

 have been accomplished within later years, has compassed 

 this animal's extermination in all but the wildest and 



