Page:The mammals of Australia Gould vol 1.djvu/267

 Thylacinus.

the comparatively small island of Tasmania becomes more densely populated, and its primitive forests are intersected with roads from the eastern to the western coast, the numbers of this singular animal will speedily diminish, extermination will have its full sway, and it will then, like the Wolf in England and Scotland, be recorded as an animal of the past: although this will be a source of much regret, neither the shepherd nor the farmer can be blamed for wishing to rid the island of so troublesome a creature. A price is already put upon the head of the native Tiger, as it is called; but the fastnesses of the Tasmanian rocky gullies, clothed with impenetrable forests, will, for the present, preserve it from destruction.

I trust my readers will duly estimate the life-sized head, taken from the living animal.

For all that is known respecting the Thylacinus cynocephalus, the reader is referred to the account given with the reduced figures.