ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 



ff. D. LeSouef 



A TYPICAL FOREST IN THE PROVINCE OF VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA 



Thii home of the beautiful Tree Fern is also the favorite haunt of the now rare Lyre Bird, the Black Tailed Wallaby, 



Yellow-Breasted and Rose-Breasted Robins, Giant Kinfrrisher and Giant Earthworm. "Fern tiullies always 



are delightful places to visit on a hot day." 



DIRECTOR LE SOUEF AND THE AUSTRALIAN FAUNA. 



In length and breadth of departure from the recognized standards of mammalian 

 anatomy and physiology, the mammals of Australia are, per capita, the most odd and re- 

 markable of anii continental group. With the exception of the dingo, a few rodents and 

 bats, all those species that do not lay eggs are marsupials, and carry in the abdominal 

 pouch the astoundingly minute newly-born young until it grows to a size fit to take a small 

 place in the outer world. A newly-horn kangaroo cannot possibly be appreciated by a 

 stranger until it is seen. 



The Australian marsupials display a remarkable line of radiating development 

 that is quite inexplicable to zoologists. This relates to the production of for'ms within an 

 order, that strikingly parallel in external appearance the characteristic forms of members 

 of various orders of mamjnals. It would appear as if the scheme of evolution among the 

 Australasian marsupials tended to produce an aggregation of pouched mammals that in 

 form and habits would cover the strange absence of other orders. The Tasmanian "wolf 

 may be cited as an example and the ant-eating echidna, with its porcupine-like quills, as 

 another. There are carnivorous, fox-like phalangers, marsupial "mice," the wombat — in 

 form and habits like a gigantic woodchuck, and the flying phalanger, which latter animal 

 is precisely like a flying squirrel in form and actions. Yet more remarkable is a marsu- 

 pial mole. 



The Neu< York Zoological Park always has been rather strong in Australian mam- 

 mals. They are so universally interesting as to be irresistible. Our Australian collection 

 is now very rich. As a contribution to public interest in these strange creatures from the 

 continent -wherein Nature has done everything differently, the distinguished Director of the 

 Melbourne Zoological Hardens has been prevailed upon In write a series of short popular 



