INTRODUCTION. 
xv 
wherein the settler would not choose to risk his fortune. The great physical features of Australia, then, as 
a whole, are the absence of high mountains and navigable rivers, its heated interior, its vast grassy plains, 
and its luxuriant brushes, particularly on its southern and south-eastern coasts. Over the whole of this 
extensive country, with its ever-varying climate, certain groups of animals are universally spread, while 
others, particularly the more isolated forms, are strictly confined to their own districts, each adapted for 
some special end and purpose, — as much as the long bill of the Humming-bird ( Docimastes ensferus ) is 
evidently formed for exploring the lengthened tubular corollas of the Brugmansice, or the greatly curved bill 
of two species of the same family of birds (the Eutoooeres Aquila and E. Condaminei ) is for insertion into the 
honey-cups of the Coryanthes speciosa and its allies, — or, to take a more striking instance, as the brush-like 
tongues of the numerous honey-feeding Parrakeets and Honey-eaters of Australia are constituted for obtaining 
the nectar from the flowers of the universally spread and equally numerous Eucalypti which form so prominent 
a feature in the flora of that country. 
I will now give, as far as my knowledge of the subject will permit, an enumeration of Australian mammals, 
the extent of their range, &c. In doing this, I shall commence with the Monotrematous section of the 
Marsupiata, which includes the Ornithorhynchus and two species of Echidna ; I shall then proceed to the 
genera Myrmecobius, Tarsipes, Chceropus, Peragalca, Perameles , Phciscolarctos, Phalangista, Cuscus , Petaurista , 
Belideus, Phascogalc, Sarcophilus, Dasyurus , Thylacinus, and Phascolomys ; and these will he fo lowed by the 
great family of Kangaroos, with remarks upon their structural differences and the especial object for which 
these appear to have been designed ; next we shall come to the feebly represented Placentals, the Seals, and 
Rodents ; and lastly, to the species of Pteropus and other Bats. 
I have considered that, in a large illustrated work like the ‘ Mammals of Australia,’ it would be out of 
place to enter into the anatomy of the objects I have represented. I have therefore omitted all details of 
this kind ; neither have I included therein a repetition of the generic characters and Latin descriptions 
which have appeared in general works on Mammalogy, where they may be easily referred to. Those 
who wish to enter more fully into the generic characters of the Australian mammals will find all the 
information they can wish for in Mr. Waterhouse’s valuable work, entitled ‘ A Natural History of the 
Mammalia,’ a publication of such great promise and merit, that it becomes a matter of surprise 
and regret to all interested in this branch of science that the publisher decided upon not continuing 
it to its completion. 
It will be observed that I have entirely omitted the Whales, Porpesses, and Dugong, my reason for so 
doing being that I had not sufficient opportunities for studying those animals in a state of nature, and there- 
fore have not attempted that which I did not understand, and consequently could not have accomplished in a 
satisfactory manner. With regard to the Dugong, I must not omit thanking my relative, Charles Coxen, Esq., 
of Queensland, for his attention in sending me a skin and part of the skeleton of this animal ; but even with 
these materials I found I could not produce an accurate representation of it in the living state. Although I 
do not inflict upon my readers the characters and distinctions of genera, I must not pass over unnoticed the 
principal features which distinguish the Marsupiata from the Placental Mammalia. In the first place, the 
former are considered to be much less highly organized than the latter : according to Professor Owen, the 
brain is deficient in both the corpus callosum and the septum lucidum ; the cerebrum is small in proportion 
d 
