Smaller still than the wallabies are the kangaroo rats, which are about the size of a large cat. I do not know if they are ever seen in Victoria; but my only acquaintance with them was in New South Wales, at a little farm where they used to come in any number on to the veranda at night, after the house was shut up; seeking for crumbs and scraps, I expect, as we had many of our meals there. The sound of their jumping feet on the bare boards used to make such a noise that I would often get up to “shoo” them away; then stand quite fascinated watching their antics in the bright moonlight. I believe they are quite easy to tame, if only they can be caught young enough, like all the kangaroo tribe; but as yet I have never had the chance of trying, though for a long time I had a tiny tame opossum, who used to love to creep up my coat sleeve, and sleep comfortably against my shoulder, in the little pent house formed by the fulness at the top. In Victoria kangaroos and wallabies are still to be found in the woods and on the wide, open plains, though each year they become more and more scarce; while among the forest trees, if you are very quiet and patient, you may yet meet with a wombat—particularly in the eastern part of the state—or a lumbering native bear, like nothing on earth so much as a child’s woolly toy, really the most ingratiating creature. Standing about two feet high, and covered with soft, thick fur, it has an odd, blunt, wistful sort of a nose, with little round eyes like boot-buttons, and makes one of the most charming of pets, if it can only be caught young enough. The native bear carries its baby on its back—the two little paws clasped tightly round its neck and buried deep in its fur—and climbs, thus encumbered, up the highest gum-trees, and from bough to bough, nibbling at the tender young leaves; the mildest person in the world, the very turn outwards of its toes giving it an almost absurdly apologetic air. “I have been left behind,” it seems to say; “but do, please, let me go on in my own way—I and these wise old woods; we understand one another, and life and leisure are pleasant things.” The wombat is heavier and clumsier, and its fur darker in hue, but it, too, is slow and peaceful in all its ways, the opossum, indeed, being the gadabout of the forest.