SOMETHING ABOUT ANIMALS 
55 
furrj' creature flying from impending death. It has felt, year 
after year, the strong, mysterious thrill of spring rushing in 
ecstasy through its frame. It has worn untiring its perennial 
crown of green whilst the gaunt skeletons of its English brothers 
were clothed with scanty snow wreaths. It has given its leaves 
for healing. It has stood age after age, a sentinel on the great 
river which winds from below Kosciusko’s snow, two thousand 
miles to the sea. Dusky faces have come and gone beneath it : 
civilised man has claimed the river and the forests ; but the 
sentinel has kept its silent watch. Steamer and barge, and 
mission launch, and fisherman’s boat have passed it. Business 
and pleasure, age and youth, love and hate, faith and doubt, 
wisdom afid folly have played their drama while it looked down 
serenely. It has given messages and salutations, and the swift 
current has been a faithful courier, and has whispered them on 
distant shores, It has planted itself, majestically strong, during 
periods of flood, when nature made holiday and spread the water 
round it for many miles. It has watched indulgently the frolics 
of the liberated streams in their titanic play-ground. Men have 
sat under its shadow while it leaned against the sapphire of the 
sk}' and looked at the sun. It knows how fair it has been, for 
often the river has been its mirror and the sunset its torch. 
Perhaps far away in some dusky busy city it lives upon an 
artist’s canvas, and weary souls, looking upon the picture of 
shady river-reaches and gum-clad banks, feel the touch of peace, 
and go away refreshed. It has waved over heroes, who, all 
unconscious of heroism, tamed their wild horses in the solitary 
bush, and who went cheerfully to answer the Imperial note of 
England’s appeal. It has accomplished its mission, fulfilled its 
law. It dies and its place on the Murray knows it no more. 
But shall the veriest pessimist say of this tree that it has lived 
in vain ? 
“ Chorvilla,” River Murray, J. M. C. 
South Australia, January, 1901. 
SOMETHING ABOUT ANIMALS. 
The Intelligence of a Mouse. 
LITTLE while ago I was watching my tame mice. 
They were apparently very busy making their bed, 
for I had put some feathers into their sleeping com- 
partment. One feather, however, had dropped into 
their run. As I was watching I saw one of the mice come out, 
and taking up the stray feather, he took it into his private 
compartment. 
The Whale. 
The Mysticetus carries his nostrils on the summit of the head 
or crown, the orifice being closed by a beautifully arranged 
