“SOME ‘CAUSES oF THE DECAY mei AUSTRALIAN FORESTS. 89 
considered in 5 dete the bark inal sap-wood and so effectually 
destroying the circulation of the tree as if it had been ringbark 
n the case now under notice the fatal operation would take place 
in the leaves. There is no doubt about the capacity of legions of 
caterpillars to destroy every green thing before them. But asa 
matter of fact there was no very unusual development of such 
creatures in the locality in question during 1862-74. In the 
Lethbridge neighbourhood a small copper-coloured beetle was 
committing ravages in the forest, as will be noticed afterwards, but 
neither caterpillar, nor beetle, nor even locust, occurred in such 
numbers about Meredith as to aeons for the destruction of forest 
trees which occurred in that district. 
But on still more minute eisai a great difference is found 
and the effect produced on the leaves of the “spectral” trees ere 
is a general regularity about the —— _ — completely 
with the capriciousness of the for rpillars or 
pursued between the outer edge and the midrib. While there is 
every variety of capriciousness in these cases, it is quite otherwise 
with the leaves from the “spectral” tree. There is one pervading 
method of procedure, namely, to take as it were a succession of 
bites first out of one side of the leaf, then out of the other, leaving 
the mere skeleton, consisting of a midrib and small portions of the 
leaf, attached thereto. Seven or eight semicircular excavations of 
this kind can often be counted on each side of the leaf. In the case 
of the caterpillars or insects, the sharp horny siege eat their 
n 
leaf are left behind as if some far larger and more powerful agent 
ad been at work 
Leaves bitten by ac opossum present the same appearance as 
leaves on “ spectral” trees.—To advance the inquiry a stage further, 
th : 
opossum and observing the manner in which he dealt ay 
leaves on which he was to be fed. Direct comparison could then 
be made between the actual — obtained from the opossum 
and those exhibited in the leaves taken from “spectral” trees. 
or less devoured 200 leaves in a single night instead of the 50 
which had been previously allowed him, When a rather scanty : 
supply was given he would devour every petioles of the leaf, also 
the more tender twigs, wigs, and even some of the bar k of the branch, 
