Of those dogs we have had many which were taken when young, but never could cure them of their natural ferocity; although well fed, they would at all times, but particularly in the dark, fly at young pigs, chickens, or any small animal which they might be able to conquer, and immediately kill, and generally eat them.  I had one which was a little puppy when caught, but, notwithstanding I took much pains to correct and cure it of its savageness, I found it took every opportunity, which it met with, to snap off the head of a fowl, or worry a pig, and would do it in defiance of correction.  They are a very good natured animal when domesticated, but I believe it to be impossible to cure that savageness, which all I have seen seem to possess.

The opossum is also very numerous here, but it is not exactly like the American opossum; it partakes a good deal of the kangaroo in the strength of its tail and make of its fore-legs, which are very short in proportion to the hind ones; like that animal, it has the pouch, or false belly, for the safety of its young in time of danger, and its colour is nearly the same, but the fur is thicker and finer.  There are several other animals of a smaller size, down as low as the field-rat, which in some part or other partakes of the kangaroo and opossum:  we have caught many rats with this pouch for carrying their young when pursued, and the legs, claws, and tail of this rat are exactly like the kangaroo.

It would appear, from the great similarity in some part or other of the different quadrupeds which we find here, that there is a promiscuous intercourse between the different sexes of all those different animals.  The same observation might be made also on the fishes of the sea, on the fowls of the air, and, I may add, the trees of the forest.  It was wonderful to see what a vast variety of fish were caught, which, in some part or other, partake of the shark:  it is no uncommon thing to see a skait’s head and shoulders to the hind part of a shark, or a shark’s head to the body of a large mullet, and sometimes to the flat body of a sting-ray.

With respect to the feathered tribe, the parrot prevails; we have shot birds, with the head, neck, and bill of a parrot, and with the same variety of the most beautiful plumage on those parts for which that bird here is distinguished, and a tail and body of a different make and colour, with long, streight, and delicate made feet and legs; which is the very reverse of any bird of the parrot kind.  I have also seen a bird, with the legs and feet of a parrot, the head and neck made and coloured like the common sea-gull, and the wings and tail of a hawk.  I have likewise seen trees bearing three different kinds of leaves, and frequently have found others, bearing the leaf of the gum-tree, with the gum exuding from it, and covered with bark of a very different kind.