Thus it
can swim about and keep alive for some time; but the cruelty is great,
and efforts are now being made to stop this tethering of codfish.

These Australian inland rivers are slow and sluggish, and fish, such as
trout, accustomed to clear running waters, will not live in them. But in
the smaller mountain streams, which feed the big inland rivers, trout
thrive, and as they have been introduced from England and America they
provide good sport to anglers.

The plain-country through which the big rivers flow is very flat, and is
therefore liable to great floods. Australia has the reputation of being
a very dry country; as a matter of fact, the rainfall over one-third of
its area is greater than that of England. In most places the rainfall
is, however, badly distributed. After long spells of very dry weather
there will come fierce storms, during which the rain sometimes falls at
the rate of an inch an hour. This fact, and the curious physical
formation of the continent, about which you already know, makes it very
liable to floods.

Great floods of the past have been at Brisbane, the capital of
Queensland, destroying a section of the city; at Bourke (N.S.W.), and at
Gundagai (N.S.W.). In the latter a town was destroyed and many lives
lost. Another flood on the Hunter River (N.S.W.) was marked by the
drowning of the Speaker of the local Parliament. But great loss of human
life is rare; sacrifice of stock is sometimes, however, enormous. Cattle
fare better than sheep, for they will make some wise effort to reach a
point of safety, whilst sheep will, as likely as not, huddle together in
a hollow, not having the sense even to seek the little elevations which
are called "hills," though only raised a few feet above the general
level.

I recall well a flood in the Narrabri (N.S.W.) district some seventeen
years ago, and its moving perils. The hillocks on which cattle, sheep,
and in some cases human beings, had taken refuge were crowded, too, with
kangaroos, emus, brolgas (a kind of crane), koalas (known as the native
bear), rabbits, and snakes. Mutual hostilities were for a time suspended
by the common danger, though the snakes and the rabbits were rarely
given the advantages of the truce if there were human beings present. An
incident of that flood was that the little township of Terry-hie-hie
(these aboriginal names are strange!) was almost wiped out by
starvation. Beleaguered by the waters, it was cut off from all
comm