BANDICOOTS AND DASYURES 
etc., they closely resemble in mode of life our American wood 
rats (Neotoma). Krefft * describes a happy captive which 
became an adept in mice catching; and says it would tumble 
the mice about with its fore paws, break their hind legs, and 
then, as a rule, eat only the head. Less typical and carnivo- 
rous are the rabbit bandicoots, which, although very long- 
eared, owe their name more to their harelike manners, food, 
and taste, than to similarity of appearance; and the out-of- 
the-way, now rare, ‘‘pig-footed”’ bandicoot of southern Aus- 
tralia, which also has much the habits of a rabbit, but makes 
grass nests and subsists largely on insects, never, apparently, 
hunting mice, as do the bandicoots proper. All the bandi- 
coots are regarded as pests by the Australian farmers, because 
they dig and tunnel in their fields after worms and roots, and 
so do the same sort of mischief as our ground squirrels. One 
remarkable feature in the bandicoot family (Peramclidz) is 
the fact that the hind feet are almost precisely like those of 
kangaroos, although it is probable-that this feature was inde- 
pendently acquired, and that the bandicoots are an offshoot 
from the next family, the dasyures, rather than near relatives 
of the kangaroos, to which they bear a greater outward resem- 
blance. 
The dasyures (Dasyuride) are the marsupial beasts of prey. 
The limbs are of nearly equal length, the feet of the ordinary 
digitigrade type, the dentition thoroughly carnivo- 
rous (doglike), the digestive apparatus fitted for 
flesh food, and the form and habits much like the wolves, 
civets, and weasels of northern climes; but all are pouched, 
and, as in the bandicoots, the pouch opens backward. The 
foremost of this predatory group, and the largest, is a ferocious 
creature known as ‘Tasmanian devil.’ It is uniformly black 
and shaggy, has a head somewhat like a bear, with jaws and 
teeth strong enough to crush big bones; and in size, strength, 
and diabolism is an imitation of the wolverine. It lives in 
507 
Dasyures. 
