wl dressed in this way on a
clean piece of bark form as good a dish as I have ever eaten.

OPOSSUM HUNTING.

Opossum hunting is pursued either by day or during a moonlight night. A
stranger cannot but be favourably impressed with regard to the quickness
of a native in discovering whether or not an opossum has ascended a tree.
The savage carelessly walks up to some massive trunk which he thinks
bears a suspicious appearance, his hands are placed thoughtlessly behind
his back, whilst his dark eye glances over the bark; suddenly it is for
one moment stationary, and he looks eagerly at the tree, for he has
detected the holes made by the nails of an opossum in its ascent; he now
seeks for one of these foot-marks, which has a little sand attached to
it, and gently blows the sand, but it sticks together, and does not
easily move away, this is a proof that the animal has climbed the tree
the same morning, for otherwise the sand would have been dried up by the
heat of the sun, and, not being held together by dampness, would have
been readily swept away before his breath. Having by this examination of
signs, which an unskilled European in vain strains his eyes to detect,
convinced himself that the opossum is in some hole of the tree, the
native pulls his hatchet from his girdle and, cutting a small notch in
the bark about four feet from the ground, he places the great toe of his
right foot in it, throws his right arm round the tree, and with his left
hand sticks the point handle of the hatchet into the bark as high up as
he can reach, and thus forms a stay to drag himself up with; having made
good this step he cuts another for his left foot, and thus proceeds until
he has ascended to the hole where the opossum is hid, which is then
compelled by smoke, or by being poked out, to quit its hiding-place,
when, the native catching hold of its tail, dashes it down on the ground
and quietly descends after it. As the opossum gives a very severe and
painful bite the natives are careful to lay hold of it in such a manner
as to run the least possible danger of being seized by its teeth.

Opossum hunting by moonlight, excepting in the beauty of the spectacle,
offers no feature different from what I have above described; the dusky
forms of the natives moving about in the gloomy woods and gazing up into
the trees to detect an animal feeding, whilst in the distance natives
with firesticks come creeping after them, is a picturesque sight, and it