with shouts and yells, by which the animals are..-so terrified and' confused, that they" easily become victims to the
bommcrengs, clubs and spears which are directed against them from all sides.
Still, however formidable an enemy the Aborigine may have been, the Great Grey Kangaroo finds, at the present time,
a far greater one in the white man, whose superior knowledge enables him to employ, for its destruction, much more
efficient weapons and assailants than those of the more simple son o f nature. Independently o f the gun, lie brings to
his aid dogs o f superior breed, and o f so savage a nature, that the timid kangaroo has but little chance when opposed
to them. These dogs, which run entirely by sight, partake o f the nature o f the greyhound and deerhound, and from
their great strength and fleetness are so well adapted for the duties to which they are trained, that its escape, when
this occurs, is owing to peculiar and favourable circumstances, as, for example, the oppressive heat o f the day, or the
nature o f the ground ; the former incapacitating the dogs for a severe chase, and the hard ridges which the kangaroo
invariably endeavours to gain giving him a great advantage over his pursuers. On such grounds the females in
particular will frequently outstrip the fleetest greyhound, while, on the contrary, heavy old males, on soft ground, are
easily overtaken. Many o f these fine kangaroo-dogs are kept at the stock-stations o f the interior for the sole purpose
of running the kangaroo and the emu, the latter being killed solely for the supply o f oil which it yields, and the
former for mere sport, or for food for the dogs. Althoiigh I liave killed the largest males with a single dog, it is not
generally advisable to attempt this, as they possess great power, and frequently rip up the dogs, and sometimes even
cut them to the heart with a single stroke o f the hind leg. Three or four dogs are more generally laid on, one o f
superior fleetness to “ pull ” the kangaroo, while the others rush in upon and kill it. It sometimes adopts a singular
mode o f defending itself by clasping its short powerful fore-limbs around its antagonist, leaping away with it to the
nearest water-liole, and there keeping it beneath the surface until drowned ; with dogs the old males will do this
whenèver they have an opportunity, and it is said that they will- also attempt to do the same with man. In Van
Diemen’s Land the Macropus major forms an object o f chase, and like the deer and fox in England, is hunted with
hounds,jmd. twice a week, during the season, the Nimrods o f this distant land may be seen, mounted 011 their fleet
steeds, crossing the ferry o f the Derwent, at Hobart Town, on their way to the hunting-ground, where they" seldom
meet without “ finding.” The following particulars o f the “ hunt ” have been obligingly forwarded to me by the Honourable
Henry Elliot, late aide-de-camp to His Excellency Sir John Franklin, and one o f its chief patrons.
“ I have much pleasure in telling you all I know, of the kangaroo-hunting in Van Diemen’s Land. The hounds are kept by
Mr. Gregson, and have been bred by him from foxhounds imported from England ; and though not so fast as most hounds here
now are, they are quite as fast as it is possible to ride to in that country.
“ The ‘ Boomer ’ is the only kangaroo which shows good sport, for the strongest ‘ Brush Kangaroo ’ cannot live above twenty
minutes before the hounds ; but as the two kinds are always found in perfectly different situations, we never were at a loss to
find a Boomer, and I must say that they seldom failed to show us good sport. We generally ‘ found ’ in a high cover of young
wattles ; but sometimes we ‘ found ’ in the open forest, and then it was really pretty to see the style in which a good kangaroo
would go away. I recollect one day in particular, when a very fine Boomer jumpéd up in the very middle of the hounds, in thé
* open ’; he at first took a few high jumps with his head up, looking about him to see on which side the coast was clearest, and
then, without a moment’s hesitation, he stooped forward and shot away from thè hounds, apparently without an effort, and gave
us the longest run I ever saw after a kangaroo. He ran fourteen miles by the map from point to point, and if he had had fair
play, I have very little doubt but that he would then have beat us ; but he had taken along a tongue of land which ran
into the sea, so that, on being pressed, he was forced to try to swim across the arm of the sea, which, at the place where
he took the water, cannot have been less than two miles broad ; in spite of a fresh breeze-and a head sea against him, he got
fully half-way over, but he could not make head against the waves any further, and was obliged to turn back, when, being
quite exhausted, he was soon killed..
“ The distance he ran, taking in the different bends in the line, cannot have been less than eighteen miles, and he certainly
swam more than two. I can give no idea of the length of time it took him to run this distance, but it took us something
more than two hours ; and it was evident, from the way in which the hounds were running, that he was a long way before us ;
and it was also plain that he was still fresh, as, quite at the end of the run, he went over the top of a very high hill, which a
tired kangaroo never will attempt to do, as dogs gain so much on them in going up hill. His hind quarters weighed within a
pound or two of seventy pounds, which is large for the Van Diemen’s Land Kangaroo, though I have seen larger.
“ We did not measure the length of the hop of this kangaroo ; but on another occasion, when the Boomer had taken along
the beach, and left his prints in the sand, the length of each jump was found to be just fifteen feet, and as regular as if they had
been stepped by a seijeant. When a Boomer is pressed, he is very apt to take the water, and then it requires several good
dogs to kill him ; for he stands waiting for them, and as soon as they swim up to the attack, he takes hold of them with his
fore-feet, and holds them under water. The buck is altogether very bold, and will generally make a stout resistance; for if he
cannot get to the water, he will place his back against a tree, so that he cannot be attacked from behind, and then the best dog
will find in him a formidable antagonist.
“ The doe, on the contrary, is a very timid creature ; and I have even seen one die of fear. It was in a place where we wished
to preserve them, and as soon as we found that we were running a doe, we stopped the hounds just at the moment they
were running into her. She had not received the slightest injury, but she lay down and died in about ten minutes. When
a doe is beat she generally makes several sharp doubles, and then gets among the branches, or close to the trunk of a fallen
tree, and remains so perfectly still, that she will allow you almost to ride over her without moving, and in this way she
often escapes. A tolerably good kangaroo will generally give a run of from six to ten miles ; but in general they do not run
that distance in a straight line, but make one large ring back to the place where they were found, though the larger ones
often go straight away.”
An extraordinary difference is observable in the size o f the sexes o f this species, the female being not more than
half the size o f the male : she brings forth one young at a time, which as soon as it is clothed with hair assumes the
colouring o f the adult.
The specimens from which my drawings and descriptions are taken were killed in the neighbourhood o f the Liverpool
range in the middle o f summer, and are both adults ; I have, however, seen larger examples o f the male. A slight
variation is found to exist in specimens from different localities, some being much darker than those represented in the
Plate, and others o f a foxy-red. Albinoes are occasionally, but very rarely, to be met with. As might reasonably
be expected also, the fur is much thicker and more woolly in winter than in summer.
The Plate represents an adult male and female.