On the Recent Zoology and Palaeontology of Victoria, 1 75 ramis approximatis brevibus, iterum ramulosis, ramulis brevis^ simis, pedicellos 1-3 unifloros gerentibus. This plant will be more fully described in my ' Contributions to Botany :' — Aristega Icevifolia, nob. — Forsan ex India orientali : v. s. in herb. Hook, e museo Soc. Ind. orient, (hb. Helford). [To be continued.] XXII. — On the Recent Zoology and Palaeontology of Victoria, By Frederick M'Coy, Professor of Natural Science in the University of Melbourne, Director of the National Mu-seum of Victoria, &c. T'o the Editors of the Annals and Magazine of Natural History, Gentlemen, I drew up the following brief notice on the above subject for our Intercolonial Exhibition, just held in Melbourne. If any part of it should seem fit for your pages, I beg to place it at your disposal. I am, Gentlemen, Your most obedient Servant, Frederick M'Coy. In the following pages I shall only refer to those species of animals affording economically useful materials, or of some spe-cial present interest in relation to unsettled scientific questions. ZOOLOGY. MAMMALIA. Very few of the Victorian quadrupeds are economically useful. The skins of the various kangaroos [Macropus and Osphranter) , wallabies (iJ«/ma^Mrws), and wombats [Phascolomys) afford various qualities of leather, but are at present very little used; and for food the only portions of any native quadruped appearing in the market are the tails of the larger kangaroo, for soup. The flesh of the smaller kinds, as well as that of wombats, opossums (Phalangista vulpina and P, viverrina, var. Victoria*), hare-kangaroos, and kangaroo-rats [Lagorcliestes and Hypsiprymnus) * The common ring-tail opossum* of Victoria has no specific relation to the rusty P. Cooki of New South Wales, and is constantly distinguishable from the P. viverrina of Tasmania, of which it is at least a variety which we may conveniently refer to under the name of P. VictoricB.
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