her hand to the spot and clasped the body of a snake just back of its
head, and with a horrified cry wrenched with all her strength to tear it
away. This was the first instinctive action of the moment, but so great
was her terror that she speedily lost all consciousness of the
situation. Her hand however still grasped the snake where she had first
seized upon it, and with such a convulsive force that the creature was
rendered powerless. The cry of the terrified girl brought the father
from within the house, who instantly came to her relief; but in the fit
which her fright had induced, her hand slowly contracted about the
creature's throat with a force which awake she could not possibly have
exerted, and before her fingers were unclasped by the aid of a bit of
the hammock cord the reptile was completely strangled. Fortunately the
creature had not bitten the girl before she seized it; and after that,
it was unable to do so. It is said to have been four feet long and of a
poisonous species.

Queensland is nearer to New Guinea on the north than Victoria is on the
south to Tasmania. The depth of Torres Strait, which separates
Queensland and New Guinea, is nowhere over nine fathoms. It is generally
believed by those who make a study of such matters that these two
countries were originally connected, and that the sea, aided perhaps by
some volcanic action, finally separated them. After a current between
them was once established, the land on each side would wear away
rapidly. The distance across the Strait is to-day less than one hundred
miles. Doubtless many of the island groups in this region were first
formed in some such manner as we have indicated. By glancing at a map of
the world the reader will observe that there are islands that extend
almost uninterruptedly from the southeastern extremity of Asia nearly
half-way across the Pacific. Oceania is the favorite word applied by
geographers to this world of islands, especially as indicating
Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania, and their immediate dependencies. Of
this system Australia forms the great central feature. Some idea of the
immensity of the Pacific Ocean may be realized when we see that there is
nevertheless an unbroken waste of waters between these islands and the
coast of America of some two thousand miles in width. These lands of
Oceania are surrounded by water not only of the widest expanse, but
also--as has been proved by scientific soundings--of the greatest de