_Australia._--The greater part, fortunately, of the island continent is typically “a white man’s country,” the temperature of latitudes south of the line being so much lower than those of the northern hemisphere that only the extreme northern part of the country comes within our limits. One would expect, for example, Brisbane, lying in 27° 28′ S., to be very hot, but an inspection of the table below shows that it is only in the north of Queensland that one may expect to meet anything approaching a tropical climate. Unfortunately the Queensland official statistics do not appear to have been collated, but the year chosen seems to be a fairly representative one. This deficiency is the more surprising as, in a country so often affected with destructive droughts, one would have expected that every effort would have been made to elucidate, by carefully drawn-up normal tables, the usual sequence of good and bad seasons. BRISBANE, QUEENSLAND. =========+===========+===========+===========+=====+===========+===== Month | Mean | Mean | Mean |Rela-| Rainfall | Num- |Temperature| Maximum | Minimum | tive| | ber | |Temperature|Temperature| Hu- | | of +----+------+----+------+----+------+midi-+----+------+Rainy | F. | ~C.~ | F. | ~C.~ | F. | ~C.~ | ty |Ins.| ~Mm.~| Days ---------+----+------+----+------+----+------+-----+----+------+----- January |72·2|~22·3~|80·9|~27·1~|63·4|~17·4~| 66 |1·40|~35·6~| 10 February |76·7|~24·8~|86·2|~30·1~|67·2|~19·5~| 64 |0·75|~19·1~| 4 March |79·7|~26·5~|88·9|~31·6~|70·4|~21·3~| 62 |1·38|~35·0~| 10 April |78·4|~25·7~|87·0|~30·6~|69·8|~21·0~| 66 |2·67|~67·4~| 7 May |74·3|~23·5~|84·2|~29·0~|64·4|~18·0~| 61 |0·63|~16·0~| 2 June |69·7|~20·9~|80·5|~26·9~|58·9|~14·9~| 64 |0·17| ~4·3~| 7 July |64·7|~18·2~|75·9|~24·3~|53·5|~11·9~| 68 |0·47|~11·9~| 3 August |63·0|~17·2~|75·1|~24·0~|50·8|~10·4~| 69 |0·06| ~1·5~| 2 September|60·4|~15·7~|71·1|~21·8~|49·7| ~9·8~| 70 |0·55|~14·0~| 9 October |60·4|~15·7~|71·5|~21·9~|49·3| ~9·6~| 67 |0·98|~24·9~| 10 November |67·0|~19·4~|76·9|~24·9~|57·1|~14·0~| 71 |1·30|~33·0~| 7 December |68·9|~20·5~|78·6|~25·9~|59·2|~15·1~| 64 |3·25|~82·5~| 9 =========+====+======+====+======+====+======+=====+====+======+===== Unfortunately, the greater part of the interior of the country is an almost waterless desert, the development of which, unless subterranean sources of water can be tapped, seems almost hopeless, and almost the whole west coast shares in this terrible disability, and would probably have remained as deserted as the interior but for the recent discoveries of its richness in gold. Even in the extreme north, at Port Darwin, the climate is by no means unendurable for a place within 12¹⁄₂ degrees of the line, and the mean rainfall, 63·21 ins., is very moderate for a place so situated.