[Since this was written I have learned that Mr. E.R.  Waite, of the Sydney Museum, has described the palu as the Ruvettus pretiosus, “which hitherto was known only from the North Atlantic, and whose recorded range is now enormously increased.  The Escolar—­to give it its Atlantic name—­has been taken at depths as great as three and four hundred fathoms, but can only be taken at night in September and the early part of October.”  I should very much like to learn how the palu is taken at a depth of four hundred fathoms—­eight hundred yards!]

The Wily “Goanner"

In the early part of the year 1899 a settler named Hardy, residing at Glenowlan, in the Rylstone district of New South Wales, about 150 miles from Sydney, lost numbers of his lambs during the lambing season.  Naturally enough, dingoes were suspected, but none were seen.  Then other sheep—­men began to lose lambs, and a close watch was set, with the result that iguanas, which are very numerous in this part of the country, were discovered to be the murderers of the little “baa-baa’s.”  The cause of this new departure in the predatory habits of the “goanner”—­which hitherto had confined his evil deeds to nocturnal visits to the fowl-yards—­is stated to be the extermination of the opossum, which has driven the cunning reptile to seek for another source of food.  And, as before the shooting of kangaroos, wallabies, and opossums was resorted to as a means of livelihood by hundreds of bushmen who had no other employment open to them, the young of these marsupials furnished the iguana with an ample supply of food, the theory is very probably correct.  Poison will be the only method of destroying or reducing the numbers of the iguana, who, robber as he is, yet has his good points, as has even the sneaking, blood-loving native cat—­for both are merciless foes to snakes of all kinds; and ’tis better to have an energetic and hungry native cat and a score of wily iguanas working havoc among the tenants of your fowl-house than one brown or an equally deadly “bandy-bandy” snake within half a mile.

In that part of New South Wales in which the writer was born—­one of the tidal rivers on the northern coast—­both snakes and iguanas were plentiful, and a source of continual worry to the settlers.

On one occasion some boyish companions and myself set to work to build a raft for fishing purposes out of some old and discarded blue gum rails which were lying along the bank of the river.  Boy-like, we utterly disregarded our parents’ admonition to put on our boots, and, aided by a couple of blackfellows, we moved about the long grass on our bare feet, picking up the heavy rails and carrying them on our shoulders, one by one, down to the sandy beach, where we were to lash them together.  Presently we came across a very heavy rail, about eight feet long, twelve inches in width, and two inches thick.  It was no sooner up-ended than we saw half a dozen “bandy-bandies”—­the