Kangaroos subsist chiefly on grass and leaves, but also eat buds, bark, roots, and fruits. Originally they were to be found all over the habitable parts of Australia and Tasmania, from the coasts inwards, and while most kinds inhabited the plains, others were to be found in the mountains. Nowadays, however, they have for the most part been driven back into the uncultivated lands of the interior, and their numbers have been greatly reduced. All the larger species associate in large bands. True kangaroos of the genus _Macropus_ are also found in New Guinea, while a few of the smaller kinds are natives of the eastern Austro-Malay Islands. The great red kangaroo, the subject of the illustration, is the largest member of the whole group, and takes its name from the dark rusty red colour of the soft woolly hair of the adult males, that of the females being a delicate bluish grey. Its home is in the rocky districts of South and East Australia. As this species is kept in most Zoological Gardens, opportunities have been afforded of observing the newly born young. These come into the world after a gestation of only thirty-nine days, when they are only about an inch and a quarter in length, and little more than shapeless lumps of animation. The newborn young is immediately transferred by the mother, by means of her lips, to the pouch, where it is attached by its sucking mouth to a nipple. Here it remains for eight months, after which it returns to the shelter of the pouch, when so disposed, for a considerable time longer: a fresh offspring being often in the pouch at the same time. THE BLUE ROLLER (_Coracias garrulus_) Among the birds of brilliant plumage which occasionally straggle to the British Isles, one of the most gaudy is the blue roller, so called on account of its roling, or “rolling,” flight. In India this and an allied species are commonly called the blue jay, while in Poland the present bird is locally termed the Polish parrot. The roller has, however, nothing to do with either jays or parrots, but is more nearly related to the king-fishers. Although the blue roller is practically an unmistakable bird--certainly so far as British species are concerned--it may be well to mention that the head, neck, wing-coverts, and under-parts are bright greenish blue, the back and shoulders cinnamon-brown, the flight-feathers blue at the roots and elsewhere black above and wholly deep blue beneath, the upper tail-coverts deep ultramarine, while the two middle tail-feathers are dirty brown, and the other feathers of the tail sky-blue, with the tips of the outer pair, which are somewhat lengthened, black. In size the bird is rather smaller than a crow.