strictly so, feed principally during the morning and evening
twilight: and as few of our mountains exceed four or five thousand feet
of elevation above the sea level, most of the animals are distributed
over the whole island, being merely influenced in their range by the
greater or less abundance of food.

All the larger species of indigenous mammals will rapidly diminish under
the united efforts of Europeans and their attendant dogs. No species is
protected, and no species spared. As the _Marsupialia_ are not prolific,
the extinction of several species may soon be anticipated, from the
circumstance that the unsettled parts of the island, to which they have
been driven, are comparatively destitute of grass, and unfit for the
support of graminivorous animals.

It may here be observed that the Dingo of New Holland never inhabited
Van Diemen's Land; and although wild dogs were at one time troublesome
in a few districts, yet they were merely the domestic dogs become wild
(many having from time to time been abandoned by their masters--aborigines
and convicts), and were soon destroyed. European rats and mice are now
common all over the island: the domestic cat, also, has in many localities
become wild, and proves very destructive to quails, and those birds which
are much on the ground.

SECTION II.--BIRDS.

Unlike the mammals, there is nothing in the general aspect of the birds
of Tasmania to distinguish them from those of other countries; there
are, however, some peculiar forms, but they are not of such a nature as
to strike the eye. Many of the birds of Europe are represented here, as
the hawks, owls, swallows, snipe, ducks, &c., and not a few have
received English names, from the real or fancied resemblance which they
bear to their British prototypes, as the magpies, wrens, robins, &c.

Mr. John Gould, in his splendid and elaborate work, _The Birds of
Australia_, has so completely illustrated and described the birds of
Australia, including those of Tasmania, that little remains to be done
by those who follow him. Whether we look at this magnificent work for
its beauty, or its accuracy, we cannot help feeling rejoiced that so
interesting a portion of the natural history of Tasmania should have
been so ably illustrated. According to Mr. Gould's work, Tasmania
possesses 170 species,[270] of which only a few, so far as at present
known, are _peculiar_ to it, that is, have not yet been found in any
other part of Australi