96 A NATURALIST IN TASMANIA ch. 



the rather inappropriate name of Tiger. The 

 pouch in the female, as in all the Marsupials which 

 progress through the scrub on all fours, opens back- 

 wards and not forwards as in the Kangaroos. The 

 muzzle and dentition are very dog-like, in fact the 

 skull can only be distinguished from that of a large 

 dog by certain important details of structure, e.g. 

 the number of the incisor teeth, and the inflection 

 of the angle of the lower jaw. It hunts by night, 

 and generally singly, but occasionally a family of 

 three or four will form a kind of pack. The lair 

 is in the forest, either in an old stump or cave, but 

 the Tiger's favourite hunting grounds are the 

 open plains between the forests and especially on 

 the large sheep runs in the Lake District. The 

 destructiveness of these animals is greatly enhanced 

 by the fact that a Tiger will only make one meal of 

 a sheep, merely sucking the blood from the jugular 

 vein or perhaps devouring the fat round the kid- 

 neys, but it never returns to the same carcass. It is 

 a cowardly animal and will not attack a man unless 

 cornered or in a trap, though it will turn on the 

 large Kangaroo-dogs when it is hunted. The shep- 

 herds wage incessant war on the creature, in the 

 summer laying traps and hunting it with dogs, in 

 the winter following up its tracks through the 

 snow. A reward of a pound is given for the head 

 by the Government, but the shepherd generally 

 rides round with the head to several sheep-owners 

 in the district, and takes toll from them all before 

 depositing it at the police station. In consequence 



