52 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 69 



species occur together at low elevations, but are very distinct as 

 shown by important cranial characters. 



A number of specimens were caught in traps set in the hope of 

 attracting more important game. Several shot at night along the 

 banks of streams were located by their shining eyes as seen under 

 the glare of a hunting lamp. Unlike Didelphis when taken in steel 

 traps these opossums are always ready to fight savagely. The 

 stomach of one taken at Gatun was well filled with fragments of 

 crabs. Fragments of birds alone, or of birds, including their feathers, 

 and crabs intermixed, were the stomach contents of several others at 

 the same locality. These limited observations indicate that birds 

 suffer much from the depredations of the opossums. A female 

 obtained carried five young in her pouch ; although they were small 

 they did not seem to cling so closely to the teats as similar young 

 of Didelphis. 



A nest of one of these opossums was found three feet from the 

 ground on a fallen log. The log lay in the dense thicket of an old 

 clearing and was heavily overhung with vines and bushes. The nest, 

 globular in form and about a foot in diameter, was placed in a well- 

 hidden spot among the vines. It was made entirely of the banana- 

 like leaves of a native plant rather neatly laid together. The opening 

 at one end faced outward along the log. The occupant slipped 

 quietly out of the nest, when I was within three feet, ran rapidly 

 along the log and disappeared in the thick vegetation. The nest 

 cavity was clean and about the size of the animal's body. 



In his original account of M. o. fuscogriseus, Dr. Allen (I. c.) gave 

 the type region as " Central America " and stated that " the locality 

 of the type of M. fuscogriseus is unfortunately not definitely known ; 

 the specimen was found in a bunch of bananas in unloading a fruit 

 steamer from a Central American port, most likely Colon." In view 

 of his indefinite reference to Colon and the fact that Panama and 

 Nicaragua appear to be inhabited by the same form I accept his later 

 fixation of the type locality. It is probably not very unusual for 

 animals of this general group to be carried away among bunches 

 of bananas. For example, a specimen of a large species of Marmosa 

 was transshipped and carried to an interior point in Texas before 

 being discovered. 



Bangs (1902, p. 19) recorded specimens collected by W. W. 

 Brown, Jr., at Boquete and Bugaba, Chiriqui. The species was 

 noted by Thomas (1903a, p. 42) from Sevilla Island off the south 

 coast of western Panama. Allen (1904, p. 57) states that Boqueron 

 specimens collected by J. H. Batty " agree well with the type of 



