BOOKS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 10731, 20 February 1897, Page 6

BOOKS.

A Sketch of the Natural History of Australia, -with Some Notes on Sport. By Fbbdehick G. Aflalo, F.R.G.S., F.Z.S., &3. Macmillan's Colonial Library. Dunedin : Jas. Horsburgh. There was undoubtedly room for such a sketch as this; and one of the more immediate results of its publication will be to convince those who, without being themselves naturalists, are yet interested in the natural history of Australia, that there is now wanted another and considerably extended sketch to satisfy the desire for information which this volume hag awakened. The plan of the book is simple enough. . The author proceeds to discuss in turn the mammals, birds, reptiles, batrachians, and fishes—the vertebrates, in short; the invartebrates being relegated to a short and summary appendix. In each great sibdivision of vertebrate life Australia has peculiarly distinct forms; as if, expressly for the behoof of. the science students of this century, a quarter of the globe had been ranched off as a preserve for the earlier and experimental forms of vertebrate life. One is too apt ignorantly to suppose that the marsupials are now represented only by a few species of opossum and kangaroo ; whereas there are to be found marsupials carnivorous, insectivorous, and herbivorous, corresponding to the chief placental types. The only carnivorous animal.* of this region (except tho dingo, or wild dog, whose title to be considered aboriginal seems to be doubtful) are marsupials—the dasyures, to wit. . Of those, the most formidable are two Tasmaniaa marsupials, the Thylacine, vulgarly called the Tasmanian |' Wolf," and the Sarcophilus or Tasmanian " Devil," the latter name having reference to the fiendish nature of this creature, which is probably the animal least amenable to kindness on the face of the planet. " Ifc is a forbidding animal this 'devil,' entirely black,, but for a ifhite band or two and the pink nose and ears. Withthe short, furry tail, it measures a couple of feet, and is particularly repulsive by reason of ths thickset muzzle and formidable teeth. Though only about half the size of the t'hylacine, it is yet more dreaded by dogs, which rarely face it alone. Its habits are similar to those of the preceding, even to the prowling on the lonely shore of a moonlight night." The dasyures, or " hairy-tails" proper, are the polecats and weasels of Australia. Then there are the so-called "pouched-mice" (Phascologale), in which the pouch has practically disappeared, b-eing now represented by a mere fold of skin. Amongst the dasyures also is the banded ant-eater (Myrmecobins), which " has no pouch, but in its place a fold of long hairs, thafc admirably protect through their helpless stage its four young. The fur is short and reddish, toning off to yellow below, and with seven white bands along the back. Its long, serrated tongue enables it to exploit ants' nests to advantage and to feed to repletion on its favourite food; besides whicb, the yelkie, a& tha natives call it near Perth, is said to attack .snakes. At any rate its mouth is furnished with 54 teeth, which it never useß, however, when handled, being a most docile creature and much in favour as a pet with children of Western Australia, to which colony ifc is practically confined." About five years ago a pouched mole also was discovered in South Australia, in the neighbourhood of Lake Eyre. The most conspicuous, however, and best [ known of the marsupials are the herbivorous kangaroos opossums. OF kangarooß Mr Aflalo enumerates over 50 species, ' grouped in various sub-divisions, as Kangaroos, Wallaroos, Wallabies, Tree-kangaroos, Jerboa Kangaroos, and so on. Mr Aflalo's chapter n the kangaroos is one of the mo3t chatty in the book. He is severely satirical oa "armchair" naturalists, whose accounts of the ,c?sngaro<' have been more surprising tnan accurate. .He defends the animal against the imputation of stupidity; and be has really earned the thanks of all fri is of the brute creation by vindicating the m^-^nal affection of the iomale kangaroo, i* has been said thav, this animal when closely pressed by dogs takes her young one froth*/ pouch and throv it away to create a di-weion, and so save her own skin atthe'exf -yof her infant. This, one is glad to be assured, is a libs! on the brute creation. i.t i 3 true that the kangaroo when hard pressed throws.away her " joey," but she throws it sidelong into some soft place in the hope of returning when she has escaped the dogs and picking up the little one, which continues lying where it falls. She no more betrays her young than the lapwing, which flaps on before the dog*, with seemingly broken wing, leaving her chickens cowering under a bunch of weeds. Mr Aflalo tells ns that as a matter of fact the hounds are rarely diverted from the chase by this action of the mother kangaroo "so that the little one generally escapes scot free after all." Australia, to the envy of the other .itic quarters of the globe, possesses the very lowest typ*, of nammal now extant: 5' index- ma-Life can be called that "as no '-wmmce, hat reproduces its young by eggs nd f&_ them' on a liquid that is not milk, which *fc pumps like perspiration through the pores of its skin, is might be expected, this grotesque cr6s-ture, which ?a neither one thing nor the other, being a** uncouth compromise between a duck and a beaver, is called .Ornithorhyncus paradoxus. In the <uore simple language of the aborigines it is the Mnllangong; whilst settlers call it the Duckbill or Dackmole. It is now, Mr Aflalo gives us to understand, like many other creatures of priceless value to science, on the road to extinction. The Duckbill, it would appear, has' a fine under fur, like the seal, and it takes 30 or 40 skins to r jmr^ a small rug. Th» or.hor _.„u,)i,i.._ T the *io»-,i«* is aiino.se as paradoxical as its cousin-german the Duckbill. Ifc is the hedgehog of the Australian continent. It has jaws which it cannot open, having to find its way through life with a mere orifice at the extremity of its snout, through Which it' protrudes its gum-tipped tongue to secure its insect food, chiefly ants. It lays eggs, which it carries in a pouch till the young are hatched; into the mouths of which young it pumps a secretion, through glands like those of the Duckbill. . The Echidna, itself an insecteater, contributes in its turn, by a sort of poetical justice frequently observable in Nature, to the support of insects. In short, not to mince matters, the Echidna has " two vigorous fleas": one of which, in keeping with the paradoxical character of the Echidna and its continent, cannot jump, which characteristic would seem to be an added terror in an insect already formidable ; for it is clear that if your fleas jump, you may escape from them sometimes, when they pay their visits elsewhere, but if they are fixed, stationary, permanent, and yet " vigorous," what respite or remission can be hoped for ? This parasitic terror, it may be added, has the suggestive name of the " AValking Eater of Echidnas," EcMdnophaga, ambulans. In his treatment of the Australian avifauna wa do not find Mr Aflalo so entertaining as when he treats of the mammals. The birds are indeed so numerous that not much more than a bare enumeration of the genera and leading species is possible. Yee the birds,, too, are as remarkable in their way as any division of Australian vertebrates. You have a kingfisher that does not fish, that is as big as a crow, and that wakes yon of a morning with bursts of lueatic laughter. The parrot family is represented by a glorious galaxy of brilliant birds, cockatoes, parrots, and parrakeeta. Swifts and swallows skim the rivers and pastures, and bnild their "procreant cradles" under the projecting eaves and verandahs of every Australian town, as if they had been used to civilised architecture for centuries. There is a gigantic wren, say as large as a pheasant, the only true and authentic possessor of the " living lyre." One family of birds, endowed with a sense of the picturesque and a taste for landscape gardening, construct bowers or playgrounds, which they adora with shells, feathers, rags, and any bright things they can, honestly or dishonestly, come by. Perhaps the moat singular, however, of all the Australian birds are the megapodes, the two best known of which are the " Mallee hen " CLeipoa) and the "brush.turkey" (Tellegallus). These birds are communist in politics, l&yiug their eggs as it were in one common depot and having them hatched by the public incubator. Tbe incubator is constructed of fermenting leaves on the principle of a melon hotbed, a carefully constructed shaft being sunk in the middle to secure ventilation. The eggs—some bushel or so—are placed in a ring in the fermenting matter, small end downward, and so that, no two are in contact. Having thus discharged a public duty by laying the eggs and providing scientifically for their incubation, the mother megapodes may be pardonad If they wash their feet of all further responsibility in respect of the public creche or nnrsery. And they bave the lees camse to feel

any maternal anxiety on tbe score of their offspring because Dame Nature, who can be so gentle a mother or so harsh a stepmother as the whim seizes her, has an opportunity here of proving herself both the one and the other. It is " mercifully " ordained, according to Mr Aflalo, "that the white ant, which frequents these mounds in such hordes that more.than one traveller has mistaken them for anthills, just as others took them at first for aboriginal graves, shall particularly like crawling over the eggshells, so as to be ready when wanted." The megapodes, it would appear, leave the egg ready fledged, and so, as soon as they have worked their way through the mound of their infancy, are ready to fly and, generally speaking, to scrape their way through the world, with no assistance from their elders.

One turns, of course, with interest to the chapter on " Snakes." " Australia," says the author, " bas, strictly speaking, about 65 snakes, rather . more than two-thirds of which are poisonous "; and then we are told about half a page further on that " Australia has between 30 and 40 harmless snakes": two statements that want reconciling. The list of venomous snakes is indeed formidable. The most dreaded are the brown snake, death adder, black snake, and the Tasmanian diamond snake. Bat even the veuomous snakes are not, Mr Aflalo thinks, so deadly ar- they are generally represented to be. Mr Aflalo's sketch of the suakes is useful as far as ifc goes: but it is necessarily meagre, and a fascinating volume remains to be written on the Australian snakes.

To many readers, more particularly to anglers, the most interesting part of the volume will be the chapters on the fishes and on angling in Australia. These subjects are treated, relatively to the rest of the book, with considerable fulness.

Whilst welcoming the popular work on the Australian fauna, we must protest against Mr Aflalo's complacent habit of ironical Barcasm afc the expense of workers in the same field wbo have gone before him. No doubt queer things have been written in the name of natural history, bufc there is no good reason why Mr Aflalo should interrupt the course of his story to be severe on statements that are no longer regarded except as myths. And if inaccuracy is Buch a very deadly sin that he must preach little sermons against it now and then within parenthesis, it might be as well for him to' verify his statement about the water snakes' that " are plentiful on the coast of New Zealand." The reckless slaughter of birds is a thing to be deplored and denounced; but the sneering mockhumility of Mr Aflalo is not, »»e should think, the proper tone to adopt, as, for instance: —"I must confess to a preference for studying live birds, and lack that useful collecting instinct which prompts gentlemen to shoot hundreds of small birds on the offchance of securing a new species on which to bestow their often unmusical names— though I fully recognise the great usefulness of these persons to science." If these " persons" are so useful to science, this gurely is their justification.

Her TF&reign Conquest, which wa have received per favour of Mr Braithwaite, is a somewhat pungent story illustrative of the combined attack made on the European marriage market by American heiresses anxious tp barter their charms for titles. Mr Savage paints the noveaux riches well, and has a character.which forcibly reminds us of Jack Brag. In the case of Her Foreign Conquest the results are not so disastrous as some which have recently come to light in real lif c,—but then the curtain falls to the sound of wedding bells.