et, made by the natives of the north-west coast from the
spinifex plant, I have not before observed. Western Australia was not
represented at the Centennial.

Queensland is the most recently established Australian colony, and
comprises the whole north-east corner--between a fourth and a fifth--of
the island. As it extends twelve degrees within the tropics, its
productions partake of a different character from those of the older
colonies, and sugar, corn and cotton are staples. The Tropic of Capricorn
crosses the middle of the province. The southern portion has 7,000,000
sheep, but the exports of the gold, copper and tin mines exceed those of
the animal and vegetable industries. The colony has the finest series of
landscapes in the Exhibition, painted upon photographs, which may be
recollected by those who visited the Centennial. The cases contain
corals, shells--especially very fine ones of the _huitre
perliere--beche-de-mer_, so great a favorite in China for stews;
dugong-hides, with the oil and soap made therefrom; silk, tobacco, manioc,
fossils, furs and wool.

New Zealand has but a small show, but it is very peculiar. The Maoris are
a very fine race of men, both physically and intellectually, and have many
arts. The robes of New Zealand flax (_Phormium tenax_), and especially the
feather robes, evince their aptitude and taste. They are very expert
workers of wood, and their spears, canoes, feather-boxes and paddles are
elaborately carved, and frequently ornamented with grotesque faces with
eyes of shell. Their idols are peculiarly hideous, and have a remarkable
similarity in their postures and expression to those of British Columbia
in the National Museum at Washington.

The section occupied by the Cape of Good Hope is somewhat larger than that
at the Centennial, but is perhaps hardly as interesting. The wars against
the Kaffirs, and the want of harmony between the Dutch settlers and the
dominant English race, have produced an uneasy feeling not compatible with
a general interest in so distant a matter as a European exposition. The
Cape, with its dependencies, has an area of 250,000 square miles and a
population of nearly 750,000. Prominent in the collection are the
elephants' tusks and horns of the numerous species of antelope, which are
found in greater variety in South Africa than in any other part of the
world. Horns of bles-boks, spring-boks, water-boks, rooi-boks, koodoos,
elands, hartebeests and gnus orname