60 ANIMALS OP NORTH AMERICA. 



traces of limbs, and are attached to the teats of the mother, 

 of which they are unable to resume their hold if it be broken, 

 these teats lying, from ten to twelve in number, within the 

 pouch. They remain thus attached until strong enough to 

 move about, but they continue to take refuge in the pouch 

 till they have attained the size of a rat. Godman objects to 

 this term premature, saying that their birth is perfectly 

 mature and regular, though apparently premature when com- 

 pared with other animals. 



There are said to be twenty-one species (probably varieties) 

 of opossum on the North American Continent, of which the 

 Virginian (Didelphis Virginiand) is the commonest, being 

 met with from the Canadian lakes to Paraguay. In its wild 

 state, this animal scopes out for itself a burrow near the 

 bushes in the neighborhood of habitations. He is essentially 

 a nocturnal animal, sleeping by day, and prowling about 

 during the night, living on such small birds and quadrupeds 

 as he can catch. He mounts the trees, penetrates into the 

 poultry yards, attacks the hens, sucking their blood, devours 

 their eggs, and when he is satisfied returns to conceal him- 

 self at the bottom of his burrow. When he cannot obtain 

 flesh, he eats fruits and other vegetables, and occasionally 

 reptiles and insects. He is a capital climber, for which his 

 sharp claws and prehensile tail are well adapted, sometimes 

 suspending himself by that appendage from the branch of a 

 tree, on the watch for some luckless bird or squirrel, that 

 may come within his reach ; he also leaps like a squirrel from 

 tree to tree with great agility. With habits of life analogous 

 to the polecat and the fox, he is much less cruel and sangui- 

 nary, nor is he so well furnished as they are with the means 

 of defence. 



In confinement he is tame and amiable, but uncleanly and 

 disagreeable. When attacked in the woods, and finding no 

 other means of escape he rolls himself into a ball, and if on 

 a tree, will fall to the ground and pretend to be dead, though 



