194 bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



nique). Apparently it was then common on Grenada; and a speci- 

 men was shown to him as a curiosity, and then thrown into the gutter, 

 for, he says, no one eats them, not even the negroes. From this it 

 seems very probable that its present occurrence on St. Vincent and 

 Dominica is due to human interposition at a somewhat recent date. 

 Mr. Austin H. Clark, who spent some months collecting among the 

 Lesser Antilles in 1903, tells me that this opossum is found also on 

 the larger Grenadines, (including Mustique, Bequia, Canouan, Union 

 Island, Carriacou, and Isle Ronde). It has apparently become less 

 common on St. Vincent and Grenada since the introduction of the 

 mongoose. It is considered a great delicacy by the negroes of the 

 present day, who esteem especially the hind-quarters and tail as 

 being the sweetest meat. It is often caught by suspending a bunch 

 of bananas over a hole dug in the ground about four feet across and 

 the same in depth, into which the animal falls in attempting to reach 

 the fruit. 



Marmosa chapmani Allen. 



Marmosa chapma?ii Allen, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1900, 13, 

 p. 197. 



Marmosa grenadae Thomas, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., 1911, ser. 8, 7, 

 p. 514. 



Two specimens from Grenada are identical in size and cranial 

 measurements with a topotype of M. chapmani from Caura, Trinidad. 

 They are, however, slightly paler cinnamon along the sides; but this 

 is apparently not more than individual variation. 



I have been able to compare with these specimens the type of M. 

 robinsoni from Margarita Id., Venezuela, in the Museum collection, 

 and find that, although the two species are quite the same in size, 

 the latter is decidedly paler, with a smaller eye spot that does not 

 extend so far posteriorly. 



Thomas (1911) has just described as Marmosa grenadae the murine 

 opossum of Grenada, from a specimen collected in 1886 and skinned 

 out from alcohol. Owing to immersion in spirit, the color characters 

 are unreliable, and Thomas states that the skull is as in the Trinidad 

 species, which he here redescribes as M . nesaea, overlooking the name 

 chapmani bestowed eleven years before on the same animal. There 

 does not seem to be good ground for recognizing either of these 

 names. 



This little opossum seems to be not rare all over the island of 



