128 MAMMALIA. 
forty-eight teeth. Their tail is hairy, and not prehensile. The 
great claws of their fore feet announce their habit of digging in the 
earth ; and the tolerable length of their hind ones, a swiftness of 
gait. 
P. nasutus, G., Ann. du Mus. IV. The muzzle much elon- 
gated ; ears pointed ; fur a greyish brown. At the first glance 
it resembles a Tenrec.(1) 
The species belonging to the second subdivision of the Mar- 
supialia have two broad and long incisors in the lower jaw with 
pointed and trenchant edges sloping forwards, and six cor- 
responding ones in the upper jaw. Their superior canini 
are also long and pointed, but all their inferior ones consist of 
teeth so small that they are frequently hidden by the gum; 
they are sometimes altogether wanting in the lower j jaw of the 
last subgenus. 
Their regimen is chiefly frugivorous; consequently their 
intestines, the cecum particularly, are longer than in the 
Opossum. The thumb is very large in all of them, and so 
widely separated from the toes that it seems to slant back- 
wards almost like that of Birds. It has no nail, and the two 
following toes are united by the skin as far as the last pha- 
lanx. It is from this circumstance that these animals have re- 
ceived the name of Phalangers.(2) ¥ 
PHALANGISTA. 
Puaxancista, Cuy.—Baxant1a, Illig.(3) 
The true Phalangers have not the skin of the flank extended ; four 
back molars in each jaw, with four points in two rows; in front a 
large one, conical and compressed, and between it and the superior 
canine two small and pointed ones, to which correspond the three 
(1) The Péraméle Bougainville of Quoy and Gaymard does not differ specifically 
from the nasutus. The Peram. obesula, Geoff. is not so authentic. 
(2) The name of Phalanger was given by Buffon to two individuals he had ob- © 
served, on account of the union of the two toes of the foot. That of Philander is 
not, as might be thought, derived from the Greek, but from the Malay word Pé- 
landor, which means Rabbit, applied by the inhabitants of Amboyna to a species 
of Kanguroo. Seba and Brisson haye used it indiscriminately for all the pouched 
animals. The Phalangers, in the Moluccas, are called Couscous or Coussous. The 
earlier travellers not haying’ properly distinguished them from the Sarigues, gave 
cause to believe that this last genus was common to the two continents. 
(3) Balantia, from Baaayrsoy, purse or pouch. 
a a 
