THE GREAT BARRIER REEF OF AUSTRALIA. 329 



of Star-fish may prove acceptable. It is by no means an uncommon 

 practice among oyster cultivators, on bringing up Star-fish in the dredge, 

 or finding them ou the banks, to rip them in pieces and cast them aside, or 

 into the water again, under the impression that their life is destroyed. As 

 a matter of fact, each of the five finger-like processes separated from the 

 Starfish's body is capable of growing into a fresh Star-fish, so that by the 

 process of dismemberment the further multiplication of the species is 

 accomplished. If only the lambs' tails, docked by the Australian pastor- 

 alist, could be induced to re-grow the lamb on the same happy principle, 

 millionaire squatters would soon become a drug in the market. To 

 encompass the certain destruction of the Star-fish, it is desirable that they 

 should be carried to land and be deposited above the reach of the tide. 

 They may also be killed immediately by immeroion in fresh water. 



Queensland possesses a fish-fauna as remarkable for the 

 number of species as for their structural variety. The number 

 authoritatively recorded, including fresh-water as well as marine 

 forms, falls but little short of 900, of which about one-third are 

 edible. Anchovies and herrings abound, and some species of 

 this family (Clupeidce) attain a length of 4 or 5 feet. The reef 

 eels, which are sometimes 20 feet long, are more dreaded by 

 the collectors of Beche-de-mer than even the sharks. As to the 

 introduction of salmon, Mr. Saville Kent is not sanguine ; for he 

 regards the failure of the attempts made in this direction as due 

 to temperature which cannot be controlled. Of 35,000 young 

 salmon, hatched and distributed amongst the Australian rivers in 

 1^44, not one is known to have returned from the sea, the reason 

 being that the marine temperature corresponds with that of the 

 coast of Europe which is outside the limits of Atlantic salmon 

 distribution. The experiment has failed in Australia for the 

 same reason that it did in the South of France. 



The photographs of Barrier Reef fishes, giving figures of 

 nearly forty species, are excellent. 



We are unable to speak so favourably of the chromo- 

 lithographs, of which there are sixteen ; two of Reef fishes, the 

 remainder depicting Anemones, Corals, Echinoderms, Beche-de- 

 mer, and Reef oysters. The drawings are hard and flat, the 

 colouring crude ; there is a want of shading necessary to give 

 rotundity of form, and, where two vivid tints meet, there is no 

 gradual blending, no delicate transition such as is observable in 

 Nature. This is a general defect in illustrations similarly 



