Page:An Australian Parsonage.djvu/216

Rh above five feet long, and apparently much disposed to resent all interference.

The screams of the frightened ladies brought out a brother armed with his gun, who immediately shot the lizard, and, with exultation more natural than scientific, chopped off its head and laid the carcass across the threshold of the house to astonish those whom the dinner-hour should bring in from the field. On hearing this story from one of the actors in it, a few years after the occurrence, the point on which we felt most curiosity was to discover whether the head of the reptile had terminated in a sharp snout like the crocodile, or in a blunt rounded form like the iguana: but the head having been unfortunately thrown away at the time of the decapitation, and an attempt to preserve the skin having proved ineffectual for want of proper means and appliances, we lost all opportunity of deciding upon the animal's true character.

That it lived "to the eastward," that the natives called it by the name of Bunny-ar, and said that it was "sulky fellow" and that they would climb trees to avoid it, were the only distinct answers that we ever obtained to our inquiries amongst them upon the subject. Khourabene seemed to retain a clear recollection of having, when quite a child, seen his father engaged in fighting with such a creature: but his notions as to the exact shape and appearance were too misty to be depended upon, and though he drew a rough outline of it upon the ground at