100 AROUND THE WORLD VIA INDIA. 



made by the steamer in their ceaseless to-and-fro flights 

 in search for the very irregular and often scanty food 

 supply. 



Many people are still under the erroneous belief that 

 Australia is an island, and few, indeed, have a correct 

 conception of the magnitude of this great continent, 

 which probably emerged from the bosom of the Pacific 

 Ocean before the other continents saw daylight. It is 

 nearly as large as the United States, inclusive of 

 Alaska. Australia was first discovered by the Dutch 

 and Spaniards in 1601-1606, and Captain Cook visited 

 it in 1770, entering Botany Bay, near where Sydney is 

 now located, April 28, where he landed and took pos- 

 session in the name of King George III. For a long 

 time England used it as a penal colony. There is per- 

 haps no other country that presents to the stranger 

 more characteristic features than Australia. Many 

 things are the reverse to those who live north of the 

 equator. When we have summer it is winter here. The 

 tropical part of Australia is in the north and the frosts 

 and occasionally a flurry of snow in the south. The 

 crescent of the moon appears to us turned around. The 

 animals are strange. It is the home of the strangest 

 of all known animals, the duck-bill platypus (Omithor- 

 hynchtbs paradoxus), which forms the connecting link 

 between quadrupeds and birds. It is about two feet in 

 length, has a flat black bill, webbed feet and body cov- 

 ered with a brown, silky fur skin like a beaver; it lays 

 eggs and supplier the young with milk from its breasts. 

 Austral in is also the land where the giant emu (Dro- 

 noeus novo3"hollandice) lives, a bird with only rudimen- 

 tary wings and in size as large as the ostrich of Africa. 

 Among the other strange animals there are the kanga- 

 roo, the wallaby, the kangaroo rat, flying fox, blind 

 snakes and a small species of bear not larger than a 

 guinea-pig, and the cassoway. a turkey as large the emu, 

 and more than sixty varieties of parrots. The vegetable 

 kingdom is characterized by its great variety. The vast 



