PREFACE. 



of the species now living on our coasts is a necessary preliminary 

 to the study by the geologist of the extinct ones in various strata. 

 I am greatly indebted to one of the most distinguished investigators 

 of these animals* my friend Dr. MacGillivray, of Sandhurst, for 

 presenting specimens of all the native species of these two genera 

 to the National Museum collection, and placing at my disposal the 

 whole of his descriptive and critical notes for the purposes of this 

 publication. The lithographic figures will, I hope, be found to be 

 perfectly efficient for the distinction of the species ; I have at least 

 spared no trouble to make them so. 



The seventh plate represents two interesting fishes not figured 

 before, one a marine species commonly called Australian Kockling, 

 and the other the most popular of the freshwater fishes of the 

 Yarra and its tributaries, the Yarra Blackfish, a new species of the 

 extraordinary genus Gadopsis, which seems to combine the charac- 

 ters of the two great systematic groups of Fishes, the Acanthop- 

 terygii and the Malacopterygii, or Anacanthini. 



The eighth plate shows the characters of a Mackerel with a 

 swim-bladder, occasionally appearing in Hobson's Bay, which I 

 believe to be identical with the Southern or Spanish Mackerel of 

 Europe. 



The ninth plate represents a fresh-water Crayfish of the genus 

 Astacoides, abounding in swamps and waterholes from Melbourne, 

 on the south, to the Murray flats, on the north extremity of the 

 colony. This is commonly called Yabber or Yabbie, and is highly 

 praised as an article of food by some, and spoken of bitterly by 

 others, from the mischief it does in boring through the banks of 

 water-dams. 



The tenth plate represents the largest-bodied of our Lepidop- 

 terous insects, the gigantic Wattle Goat-moth, the larva of which is 

 very destructive to the Wattle or Acacia trees, so valuable for their 

 tanner's bark, by boring great holes in the timber, on which they 



[5] 



