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IX. On the Osteology of the Marsupialia.—(Part V.) Fam. Poephaga, Genus Macropus. 
By Professor Own, C.B., P.RS., F.Z.S., &e. 
Read June 2nd, 1874. 
[Puates LXXIV.-LXXXIII.] 
§ 1. Introduction. 
THE combination of the marsupial economy with herbivorous diet, and of unguiculate 
fore paws having the requisite extent and variety of movements for the manipulation 
of the pouch with a power of swift and extensive locomotion for attaining fresh 
pastures and escaping enemies, results in one of the most singular modifications of the 
terrestrial mammalian form ; and one cannot be surprised that a passing glimpse of the 
first Kangaroo by Banks and his fellow voyagers on their landing at Botany Bay left 
the impression that they had seen hopping away from them some strange, large, new, 
wingless bird. 
In fact, the work of ordinary locomotion on land, in the poephagous Marsupials, 
is transferred to and concentrated upon the hinder end and members, the fore limbs 
being reserved, as in birds, for other functions. This involves modifications of the 
whole frame, and especially of the proportions and structure of the caudal vertebra and 
pelvic limbs. 
Pander and D’Alton, in their elegant work on the skeletons of the Mammalia’, have 
given in the Part devoted to the Marsupialia’ reduced views of the skeletons of 
Macropus major, Shaw, and M. (Halmaturus) elegans, F. Cuvier, with full-sized 
figures of those of Hypsiprymnus murinus, Illig., and of some species of Didelphys. In 
the same Part the skull and atlas of Macropus major are figured of the natural size, 
and a somewhat reduced view is given of the carpus and tarsus in that Kangaroo. A 
front view of the pelvis of a young Kangaroo, in relation to its osteogeny, is given in 
my article “ Marsupialia”*; and the bony palate, with the dentition and part of the 
base of the skull of Macropus bennettii, is figured, of the natural size, in the first of 
the present series of papers‘. I may also refer to a sketch, by Pallas, of a skull of a 
young Macropus major, and to a reduced figure of a section of the skull of the Thylacine 
(No. 1905, Mus. of the Royal College of Surgeons, Catalogue of the Osteology, 4to, 
‘In oblong folio, 1821-31. 2 «Die Skelete der Beutelthiere,’ Bonn, 1828. 
* Cyclopedia of Anatomy, vol. iii. (1847) p. 284, fig. 110. 
“Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. ii. (1838) p. 406, pl. 71. fig. 5. 
VOL. 1X.—PART vil. March, 1876. 3L 
