210 FAUNA OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA 



black spots. A maggot is the best bait for these fish, 

 and if they are in the humour to bite, fifty or sixty may 

 be captured in the course of an afternoon's sport. 



Insects are numerous and curious in the Champion 

 Bay and Swan River districts, but the only invertebrate 

 animal I can find space to mention is a very singular 

 springing centipede of considerable length — generally 

 thirteen or fourteen inches ; but one very fine specimen 

 I captured was nearly seventeen inches long. This 

 centipede is of a coppery hue, with greenish reflections, 

 and frequents plains on which the herbage is short and 

 scanty. When disturbed, and wishing to ensure its escape 

 from danger, it draws the tail end of its body up to the 

 head, forming a loop in the manner of some caterpillers 

 when progressing along a twig. Then the centipede 

 suddenly springs a distance of twelve or sixteen feet, 

 and repeats the movement, generally disappearing in two 

 or three springs. 



This centipede seems to be unknown to science. Some 

 which I sent to a friend were lost while passing through 

 the post, and unfortunately I did not hear of this until 

 it was too late to obtain others. It does not seem to be 

 very abundant nor very widely spread, many of the 

 colonists never having seen it, and most of those who 

 had expressing great fear and abhorrence of it; and it 

 must be confessed that a centipede considerably exceeding 

 a foot in length is a rather formidable-looking creature. 

 If this animal is a true centipede, and I have some doubt 

 about it, I think it will prove to be the largest of its 

 genus, while its peculiar habit renders it one of the most 

 noticeable. In vain have I searched books for a reference 

 to this arachnida, and visited museums in search of a 

 preserved specimen, and the only gentleman of education 

 and literary culture whom I could find acquainted with 

 it was Mr Davenport Cleland, who is an authority 

 on Australian subjects, but scarcely, I think, a finished 

 naturalist. He, like the farmers of the Champion Bay 

 district, seems to have had too great a dislike to the 

 creature to examine it very closely. This centipede was 



