A Few Natives Then Shew Themselves In A Direction Opposite To That Of The Net, And The Kangaroo Being Alarmed, Takes To His Usual Path, Gets Entangled In The Meshes, And Is Soon Despatched By Persons Who Have Been Lying In Wait To Pounce Upon Him.

Pitfalls are also dug to catch the kangaroo around the springs, or pools of water they are accustomed to frequent.

These are covered lightly over with small sticks, boughs, etc. and the animal going to drink, hops upon them, and falls into the pit without being able to get out again. I have only known this method of taking the kangaroo practised in Western Australia, between Swan River and King George's Sound,

The emu is taken similarly to the kangaroo. It is speared in the first, third, and fourth methods I have described. It is also netted like the kangaroo, indeed with the same net, only that the places selected for setting it are near the entrance to creeks, ravines, flats bounded by steep banks, and any other place where the ground is such as to hold out the hope, that by driving up the game it may be compelled, by surrounding scouts, to pass the place where the net is set. When caught the old men hasten up, and clasping the bird firmly round the neck with their arms, hold it or throw it on the ground, whilst others come to their assistance and despatch it. This is, however, a dangerous feat, and I have known a native severely wounded in attempting it; a kick from an emu would break a person's leg, though the natives generally keep so close to the bird as to prevent it from doing them much harm.

The emu is frequently netted by night through a peculiarity in the habits of the bird, that is well-known to the natives, and which is, that it generally comes back every night to sleep on one spot for a long time together. Having ascertained where the sleeping place is, the natives set the net at some little distance away, and then supplying themselves with fire-sticks, form a line from each end of the net, diverging in the distance. The party may now be considered as forming two sides of a triangle, with the net at the apex and the game about the middle of the base; as soon as the sides are formed, other natives arrange themselves in a line at the base, and put the bird up. The emu finding only one course free from fire-sticks, viz. that towards the net or apex of the triangle, takes that direction, and becomes ensnared.

Opossums are of various kinds and sizes. They inhabit the hollows of trees, or sometimes the tops, where they make a house for themselves with boughs. They are also found in the holes of rocks. They are hunted both in the day-time and by moon-light. During the day the native, as he passes along, examines minutely the bark of the trees, to see whether any marks have been left by the claws of the animal in climbing on the previous night.

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