1865.] Sclater on the Mammals of Australia. 17 



these predatory forms, a few words must be said about two genera, 

 which although they belong to the same family are insectivorous, rather 

 than carnivorous, both in habits and structure. One of them — the 

 Banded Myrmecobius — constitutes another of those remarkable isolated 

 types, which are so frequent in Australian zoology. The Myrmecobius, 

 so called from its food being supposed to be ants, was first discovered 

 in Western' Australia, though it is said to have occurred also in the 

 inner districts of the other Southern colonies. It is of about the 

 same size as a common Squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris), and in the words of 

 that accurate observer, the late Mr. Gilbert, appears very much like 

 that animal, "when running on the ground, which it does in successive 

 leaps, with its tail a little elevated, every now and then raising its body 

 and resting on its hind feet." Besides the peculiarities of its denti- 

 tion (among which are its numerous prickly-pointed molar teeth), the 

 Myrmecobrius is remarkable for its somewhat harsh fur, and long 

 bushy tail, together with the entire absence of a pouch in the female, 

 so that the young hang on to the nipples of the mother absolutely un- 

 protected, except by the long hairs which clothe the under surface of 

 the abdomen. The latter peculiarity, however, likewise obtains in 

 certain members of the next genus Phascologale, of which numerous 

 species are found throughout Australia. Mr. Gould, in his work on the 

 Mammals of Australia, figures seventeen of them, dividing them into 

 several sections, Phascogale, Antechinus, and Podabrus. They vary 

 in size from the Phascogale peniciilata, which is large and strong 

 enough to plunder the settlers' henroosts, down to the Antechinus 

 minutissimus — the smallest of known Marsupials, which is not much 

 bigger than the Harvest-mouse of Europe. Two genera of purely 

 flesh-eating animals follow the Phascologalce, and close the series of 

 Marsupials. These are Dasyurus with five species, spread over dif- 

 ferent parts of Australia, and Tliylacinus with only one existing species, 

 now confined to the mountainous districts of Tasmania. The latter 

 animal is well known to the frequenters of the Gardens of the Zoolo- 

 gical Society of London, as one of the finest and most interesting of 

 the whole Marsupial series. The general external appearance of the 

 Thylacine is so much like that of a large dog, that the uninitiated can 

 hardly be persuaded that its proper place is in another order of Mam- 

 mals, and even professed naturalists have fallen into the grave error 

 of arranging it with the Carnivora, with which, I need hardly say, it 

 has no real affinity. 



Having completed our survey of the Implacental Mammals of 

 Australia, we must now consider the Placental series, which, as has 

 been already shown, plays a very subordinate part in this extraor- 

 dinary Fauna. Putting aside the three Marine Orders — the Seals, 

 Whales, and Sirenians, which have entirely different laws of distribu- 

 tion, and confining our attention to the terrestrial Mammals, we find 

 only three of the orders, namely, the Rodents, Bats, and Carnivores, 

 with any representatives in this strange country. And the Carnivores 

 will be perhaps more fairly excluded altogether from the Australian 

 series, since the solitary member of this group is the semi-domesticated 

 Dingo, hardly to be ranked as a wild species. Quadrumana, Insec- 



VOL. II. c 



