of the house, wherever she went, but would follow no one else. When she
sat down, it came and nestled by her side with all the confidence
imparted by a sense of perfect protection. The kangaroo has a
wonderfully expressive face, more than half human, with a head and large
plaintive eyes quite like those of a fawn of the red-deer species. The
ears are long, nervously active and extremely delicate, seeming to be
almost transparent when seen against a strong light. Tasmania once
swarmed with kangaroos, but the hunters here, as upon the mainland, have
nearly obliterated the species. Full-grown males sometimes measure six
feet when standing upright, and weigh about one hundred and fifty
pounds. The sharp claws of the short fore-feet are powerful weapons, and
if brought to bay by the dogs when hunted, the male kangaroo will
sometimes turn upon his pursuers and with his claws disembowel the
largest dog. When unmolested, however, they use these fore-paws like a
squirrel, holding their food and carrying it to their mouths with them
as we do with our hands.

The fish-market of Hobart was to us quite interesting. The local
denizens of the sea here seem to have a physiognomy, so to speak, all
their own, differing in shape, colors, and general aspect from those
with which we were elsewhere familiar. Long, slim, pointed fish are here
a favorite; and others, so like young sharks as to make one shudder at
the thought of eating them, found ready purchasers. The lobsters were
quite unlike our New England species; indeed, they are here known as
cray-fish, or craw-fish. They have, in place of a smooth, soft shell, a
corrugated one, pimply like the red face of an inveterate toper, and so
hard are they as to require a hammer to break out the meat that forms
the body, while they are entirely lacking in the claws which form so
prominent a portion of our common lobster. The oysters here seem to be
equally uninviting, as the shells are so crumpled that it becomes a
mystery where the knife should be inserted to obtain the very small
quantity of edible matter forming the body of the oyster. How Wareham,
Blue Point, or Shrewsbury Bay oysters would astonish people who are
satisfied with these apologies for first-class bivalves!

About twenty miles from Hobart one finds a forest of the remarkable
gum-trees of which we have all read,--trees which exceed in height and
circumference the mammoth growths of our own Yosemite Valley, and fully
equal those