OF NEW HOLLAND. 341 



all the smaller species, not only of marsupials, but likewise of 

 quadrumanous and carnivorous mammals, do the same ; but 

 the united testimony of all competent observers who are ac- 

 quainted with the animals in their native habitats, warrants 

 us in concluding that the staple of their food is derived from 

 the vegetable kingdom. 



The genera which exhibit this form of dentition are Didel- 

 pliis, Cheironecies, Thylacinus, Phascogale, Dasyurus, and 

 Perameles. 



The second form of dentition which is exhibited among the 

 marsupials, consists of six incisors in the upper and only two 

 in the lower jaw; minute canines, confined to the upper jaw 

 or wanting altogether, and five or six permanent molars 

 throughout, separated from the incisors or canines by a va- 

 cant space of considerable extent, which sometimes contains 

 one or two minute deciduous teeth, commonly counted as false 

 molars. The superior incisors are erect and contiguous ; but 

 the inferior are long, edged, and procumbent in so remarkable 

 a degree, as to lie entirely in the plane of the inferior ramus 

 of the lower jaw; the true molars are furnished with blunt 

 tubercles, and indicate a frugivorous regimen ; whilst the ru- 

 dimentary false molars of the lower jaw are in some instances 

 contiguous to the long procumbent incisors, and inclined in 

 the same direction, so that they ought perhaps more properly 

 to be regarded as belonging to this class of teeth ; a view of 

 the subject which tends considerably to break the abruptness 

 of the transition, and to diminish the hiatus between the den- 

 tition of these animals and that of the Opossums and Cheiro- 

 nectes, to which they are so closely related by other influen- 

 tial parts of their structure. 



Though this system of dentition betokens a pre-eminently 

 frugivorous regimen, it is not to be supposed that the food of 

 the animals possessing it is exclusively confined to the vege- 

 table kingdom. On the contrary, those genera which ap- 

 proach most nearly to the former group in other parts of their 

 structure, exhibit a marked predilection for animal food ; nor 

 is there any very striking difference, in this respect, between the 

 appetites of the Australian phalangers and the American opos- 

 sums. I have made numerous experiments upon the living 

 animals, for the purpose of ascertaining this point, and inva- 

 riably with the same result ; proving that the regimen of the 

 pedimanous marsupials is really omnivorous, and made up 

 indifferently of animal and vegetable substances ; a result 

 which is confirmed by the testimony of all writers. Other 

 marsupials possessing the macropoid form of dentition, such 

 as the kangaroos and wombats, are, indeed, restricted to a 



