306 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



Kangaroo. The word Bettong is a native name for a group 

 of small kangaroos that are easily recognised hy the shape of 

 their heads, which are peculiarly short, thick, and round, and 

 very unlike the long deer-like head of the larger kangaroos. 



The Brush-tailed Bettong is about as large as a hare, and its 

 tail is not quite a foot in length, though it appears longer in 

 consequence of a brush-like tuft of long hair which decorates the 

 end. It is a pretty creature, elegant in shape, extremely active, 

 and the white penciUings on the brown back, the grey-white 

 belly, and the jetty tuft on the tail are in beautiful contrast to 

 each other. 



The home of this animal is a kind of compromise between a 

 burrow and a house, being partly sunk below the surface of the 

 ground and partly built above it. The localities wherein the 

 Bettong is found are large grassy hills whereon there is hardly 

 any cover, and where the presence of a nest large enough to 

 contain the animal, and yet small enough to escape observation, 

 appears to be almost impossibla The Bettong, however, sets 

 about its task by examining the ground until it finds a mode- 

 rately deep depression, if possible near a high tuft of grass. 



Using this depression as the foundation of the nest, it builds 

 a roof over it with leaves, grass, and similar materials, not high 

 enough to overtop the neighbouring herbage, and being very 

 similar to it in external appearance. Grass of a suitable length 

 cannot always be obtained close to the nest, and the Bettong is 

 therefore obliged to convey it from a distance. This task it per- 

 forms in a manner so curious, that were it not related by so 

 accurate and trustworthy an observer as Mr. Gould, it could 

 hardly be credited. After the animal has procured a moderately 

 large bunch of grass, it rolls its tail round it so as to form it into 

 a sheaf, and then jumps away to its nest, carrying the bunch of 

 grass in its tail. In Mr. Gould's work on the Macropidae of 

 Australia, there is an illustration which represents the Bettong 

 leaping over the ground with its grass sheaf behind it. After 

 the nest has been completed, the mother Bettong is always care- 

 ful to close the entrance whenever she leaves her home, pulling 

 a loose tuft of grass over the aperture. 



To an ordinary European eye, the homes of the Bettong are 

 quite undistinguishable from the siuTOunding grass. The natives, 

 however, seldom pass a nest without seeing it, and destroying 



