The strange marsupials, the snakes, the great running birds, the wild dogs of Australia, have no counterpart in New Zealand.

The climate of Australia, south of Capricorn, is, except on the eastern and south-eastern coast, as hot and dry as the South African.

And the Australian mountains, moderate in height and flattened, as a rule, at the summit, remind one not a little of the table-topped elevations so familiar to riders on the veldt and karroo.

The western coast of New Zealand is one of the rainiest parts of the Empire.

Even the drier east coast only now and then suffers from drought On the west coast the thermometer seldom rises above 75 deg.