When a great number of opossums are caught at one time, they are cooked in an oven in the same manner as the kangaroo is cooked.
The several kinds of opossums eaten by the natives of Victoria are as follow:—
Native Name—Lake Tyers. | ||
| Opossum (common) | Wadthan | Phalangista vulpina. |
| Black opossum | Brak | Phalangista fuliginosa (Tasmania only[1]). |
| Ring-tail opossum | Blaang | Phalangista viverrina. |
There is also the Phalangista canina, the native name of which I have not obtained.
Wombat.
The wombats (Phascolomys platyrrhinus and P. niger)—the Naroot Norngnor or Warren of the natives—are odd-looking creatures, with clumsy, fat bodies, very short legs, and coarse hair. The specimens I have examined were gentle in their habits—not at all pugnacious, but very obstinate. One in confinement was shown a door where he could escape, and I attempted to stop him, but he thrust himself forward with a strength and determination for which I was unprepared. I used the utmost force to keep him back, but he good-naturedly struggled with me, and finally gained the victory. He is not a handsome creature; but, when cooked, is said to afford some appetising morsels. Lieut.-Col. Collins says:—"The wombat, or, as it is called by the natives of Port Jackson, the womback, is a squat, short, thick, short-legged, rather inactive quadruped, with great appearance of stumpy strength, and somewhat bigger than a large turnspit-dog. Its figure and movements, if they do not exactly resemble those of the bear, at least strongly remind one of that animal. Its length from the tip of the tail to the tip of the nose is thirty-one inches, of which its body takes up twenty-three inches and five-tenths. The head is seven inches, and the tail five-tenths. Its circumference behind the fore legs, twenty-seven inches; across the thickest part of the belly, thirty-one inches. Its weight by hand is somewhat between twenty-five and thirty pounds. The hair is coarse, and about one inch or one inch and five-tenths in length, thinly set upon the belly, thicker on the back and head, and thickest upon the loins and rump; the color of it a light sandy-brown of varying shades, but darkest along the back. This animal has not any claim to swiftness of foot, as most men could run it down. Its pace is hobbling or shuffling, something like the awkward gait of a bear. In disposition it is mild and gentle; but it bites hard, and is furious when provoked. Mr. Bass never heard its voice but at that time; it was a low cry, between a hissing and a whizzing, which could not be heard at a distance of more than thirty or forty yards."
In those parts of the colony where there is ground suitable for the wombat, whose habit is to burrow, he is found in great numbers. He has given names
