MARSUPIALS AND THEIR SKINS 253 



used in considerable quantities in this country for 

 making hearthrugs. 



But the whole race and nation of kangaroos, 

 wallaroos, and wallabies are being destroyed without 

 any use being made of their fur at all. In Australia 

 a wallaby rug, almost as fine as beaver skin, can be 

 bought for two pounds. In England we make them 

 into shoe-leather. The demand for this alone threatens 

 to exterminate most of the species, just as in time the 

 new material, 'electric sealskin' made from rabbit-fur 

 may kill off the plague of Australian rabbits. But 

 in that case we shall have the fur in the form of 

 * electric seal ' as a memorial. The growing scarcity 

 of the 4 great original ' of all kangaroos was shown in 

 a practical manner three years ago, when the ' boxing 

 kangaroo ' was in the height of his fame. This 

 animal was said to have earned twenty thousand pounds 

 in twelve months ; and whether this sum was correctly 

 stated or not, it was admitted at the Royal Aquarium 

 that he had made more money than any other animal 

 more, even, than the most celebrated racehorses had 

 earned, whether in training or after. Now, though 

 this particular ' old man ' kangaroo boxed every day 

 with a regularity and apparent zeal which would not 

 have discredited a human professional, the secret of this 

 performance lay not in any special teaching of the 

 animal, but in the cleverness by which his owner had 



