Natural History of Victoria

Abstract

JUST ten years ago, Prof. Frederick McCoy decided, under instructions from the Victorian Government of the day, to commence the publication of a series of short descriptions, accompanied by coloured figures, of the indigenous members of the different classes of the animal kingdom. These were to be published in parts containing ten plates in each, which have appeared with commendable regularity to the present time. As the fauna of Victoria was not as well known as its flora, it was a necessary preliminary, in order to effectually carry out such a scheme, to have a large number of drawings made, as opportunity arose, from the living or quite recent examples of many species of reptiles, fish, and the lower animals, the true characters of which, in many cases, were but imperfectly known, from their having been described from often badly-preserved specimens.

Prodromus of the Zoology of Victoria.

Decades 1–15. By Prof. F. McCoy. (Melbourne, 1878–87.)