NOTES OF THE EDIBLE FISHES OF VICTORIA. 
whu'h some utiIvUowti cuusc, doviftted its couisc, 
had stnick tlie terrestrial globe and l>ecome one (»f its ingredient 
parts. Tlic author tlnnks that not only the animals of this great 
island, but also its aborigines, are different enough from all others 
to su[>port a,nd prove such an extraordinary tlieoiy. He (-oneei vt's 
the animals and the men themselves as belonging to races (juite 
diderent from ourselves, and the latter he represents as descend- 
ants from a different Adam, and oa* a proof tkftf the pUtneU are 
irihjtbifed! 
L(iss imagination and a closer observation of facts would have 
letl him to see that the Australian blacks are closely allied to the 
Papfmn>< of New Guinea, to tlie aboriginal tribes of the centi-al 
])arts of most of the great islands of the Indian Archipelago, to 
the Maatri.O'^ I have myself observed in the interior of the Malayan 
Peninsula. This black race is only the remnant of vast popula- 
tions wliich once covered the greatest part of India, and proliably 
ol‘ Europe itself during tlie stone period. In that last continent 
this race was coiupiered from the cast by the white race of central 
Asia, and })robably also from the west by the red oiui of Atlantirla, 
as I believe that’ long before Euro[)c discovered America it liad 
been itself c.on(|uered by tlie more civilised nations, who inhabited 
the now submarine regions, which formed the eastern portion of 
the American continent. Tlie Austmlian man is not isolated in 
creation, and if we come to the animals of the southern continent 
we tind that this is ceiiaiidy the centre of the marsujiials, as at 
least one hundred and ten of their soi'ts inhabit that continent, 
})ut the Dendrolofji, or tree kangaroos, are found in New 
Guinea, as is also l)oVixip>>i>i Brwv,p and that America has, in 
its genus DUldphw, several representatives of tlie same type. We 
must also take in great consideration that if the marsupials have 
at our period a limited liabitat, they have not always been so 
restricted. They have livtal in most countiies of Europe, and botli 
England and France contain tlieir fossil remains ; these countries 
even seem to have been much more suited to them than Aus- 
tralia, as our present [)ouc1hmI animals are very small re|>rescnta- 
tives of their lost prerlecessors, which were sometimes equal in 
size to a full-grown Rh’nboceros. It is evident that at one time 
tlie entire nlobo must have had much resemblance with what 
o 
Australia is to-day. 
The absence of qtoadrK/nvriut^, cavnivovtt, and ruminantut is 
very remarkable. It must also be observed that the most 
anomalous animals, sucli as the pL<d‘ijpi('% echidrot, and tvomlrdn, 
are restricted to its southern or more distant ]>ortion, the nortliern 
regions oi* the continent liaving on the contrary a fauna very 
similar to the one of Ne,w Guinea. In most instances the animals 
belong to the same natural families, and often (^veii to the same 
