Page:Victoria, with a description of its principal cities, Melbourne and Geelong.djvu/91

 seen herding with the sheep and cattle, with whom they live on very peaceable terms. They never have more than two young at a time, which they carry in a pouch under the belly, and from which the young are in the first place born; and this peculiarity is in all the different kinds, down to the little mouse. The flesh is good for eating, but, not having any fat, requires to be well larded and dressed in a particular manner; the tail particularly is as famed for soup as the ox-tail; it is large and long, and used to guide them in their extraordinary movements. The skin is tough and strong, and makes the finest leather in the world for ladies' shoes. Untanned, but preserved with the hair on, it forms a splendid rug, impervious to rain, and was the only covering used by the natives in former days. When not excited in the chase, their motions, skipping and jumping from their hind-legs, is very graceful and elegant. When, however, they are hunted, they go off in one continued succession of rapid bounds, leaping, each one, over fifteen to twenty paces. The chase of these animals in several parts of Australia and Tasmania is as regular as our fox-hunting in England, and dogs of a particular breed are kept for that purpose. We will close this chapter with a short account of the last one we were present at.

It was on a fine morning in the month of June, which corresponds with the English November, that, as the sun gilded the tops of the Warraboo Hills, in company with a gay young soldier, lately