ANIMALS. 



447 



OF THE OPOSSUM, AND ITS KINDS.* 



To tliese four-handed animals of the ancient continent, we 

 may add the four-handed animals of the new, that use their hands 



» Pouched animals were known at first only in America ; all the species 

 found on that continent agree so completely in general org-anization, as 

 well as in this peculiar conformation of the genitals, that Linnseus found 

 In them the elements of a single genus, which he called Didelphis or double 

 worabed. 



Afterwards from the East Indies, and still later from the regions of Aus 

 tralasia, animals arrived equally distinguished by the possession of the al> 

 dominal pouch ; these were immediately set down as genuine Didelphes, 

 and Gmcliu has bestowed on them the titles of Didelphis Orientalis, Didel- 

 plus Brunii, &e. ; and even the Tarsier of Daubenton he inscribed among 

 them, under the name of Didelphis Macrotarsus. None, however, of these 

 animals answered to the definition of Linne ; all had less than six incisors 

 above, and less than eight below, &c. : nevertheless, Fallas, Camper, and 

 Zimmerman still preserved the appellation of Gmelin, and thus prolonged 

 the abuse. 



At first an opinion arose that the young of these animals were actually 

 produced in the abdominal pouch beside the mammae of the mother. It is 

 nearly two centuries since Marcgrave has said, " The pouch is properly the 

 matrix of the Carigueya {Didelphis Opossum). 1 have been imable to find 

 any other ; this is a point which I have ascertained by dissection. The se- 

 men is produced there, and the young are formed." Pison confirms the 

 same fat^s, having, as he observes, dissected many of the carigueyas. Va- 

 lentyn, makes the same assertion, in his account of the Molucca Islands : 

 " The pouch of the philanders is a matrix in wliich the young are conceived. 

 This pouch is not what is usually supposed. The mammae are, with regard 

 to the young, what stalks are to their fruits." The young remain attached 

 to the mammae, until they have attained maturity, and then separate from 

 them as the fruit drops from the stalk. 



These notions are also common in Virginia, even among physicians. Be- 

 verly says, that the young opossum exists in the false belly, without over 

 entering the true, and are developed on the teats of the mother. The Mar. 

 quess of Chastellux makes a similar remark. Hence Pennant says, " That 

 suspended to the mammae of the mother, they remain there at first without 

 motion : this lasts until they have acquired some development and strength ; 

 but then they undergo a second birth." 



Tavo opossums, {Didelphis Virginiana,) male and female, were domesti- 

 cated in the house of M. d'Aboville, in 1783 ; these animals copulated, anil 

 the effects were attentively observed by that gentleman : in about ten days 

 the edge of the orifice of the pouch grew thicker, a phenomenon which af- 

 terwards grew more perceptible. As the pouch increased in size, the ori. 

 (ice widened. On the thirteenth day, the female did not quit her retreat 

 except to eat, drink, and evacuate : on the fourteenth she did not stir from 

 it. M. d'Aboville then determined to seize and examine her : the pouch, 

 the aperture of which had widened before, was now nearly closed ; a slimy 



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