No. 410.] MYRMECOPHAGA AND DIDELPHIS. 145 
This conclusion, if accepted, will have the double advantage 
of retaining the familiar term virginiana for the Virginian opos- 
sum, and abolishing so jaw-breaking a name as harkinophaga. 
In the necessity of renaming Philander I am compelled to 
acquiesce, though I may express a regret that in giving the 
name Caluromys Dr. Allen has departed from the modern 
practice of restricting the ending -mys to members of the 
Rodentia. 
But of his transference of the species cinereus and alstoni 
from Marmosa to Caluromys I find it more difficult to approve, 
for the points that he mentions as allying them to the latter are 
all found in different degrees in one or other of the larger 
species of Marmosa, including M. murina, while neither cinereus 
nor alstoni present those which are more truly characteristic of 
Caluromys. The general shape of the skull of the latter, the 
small rounded molars, the great sabre-like canines, the curi- 
ously shaped lower jaw, and many other characters make up 
an ensemble to which, as it appears to me, neither of the 
species referred to shows any real approximation. I should 
therefore consider them both as members of the genus 
Marmosa. i 
BRITISH MUSEUM, NATURAL HISTORY. 
