60 
ANIMALS OF NORTH AMERICA. 
traces of limbs, and are attached to the teats of the mother, 
of which they are unable to resume their hold if it be broken, • 
these teats lying, from ten to twelve in number, within the 
pouch. They remain thus attached until strong enough to 
move about, but they continue to take refuge in the pouch 
till they have attained the size of a rat. Godman objects to 
this term premature , saying that their birth is perfectly 
mature and regular, though apparently premature when com- 
pared with other animals. 
There are said to be twenty-one species (probably varieties) 
of opossum on the North American Continent, of which the 
Virginian (. Didelphis Virginiana') is the commonest, being 
met with from the Canadian lakes to Paraguay. In its wild 
state, this animal scopes out for itself a burrow near the 
bushes in the neighborhood of habitations. He is essentially 
a nocturnal animal, sleeping by day, and prowling about 
during the night, living on such small birds and quadrupeds 
as he can catch. He mounts the trees, penetrates into the 
poultry yards, attacks the hens, sucking their blood, devours 
their eggs, and when he is satisfied returns to conceal him- 
self at the bottom of his burrow. When he cannot obtain 
flesh, he eats fruits and other vegetables, and occasionally 
reptiles and insects. He is a capital climber, for which his 
sharp claws and prehensile tail are well adapted, sometimes 
suspending himself by that appendage from the branch of a 
tree, on the watch for some luckless bird or squirrel, that 
may come within his reach ; he also leaps like a squirrel from 
tree to tree with great agility. With habits of life analogous 
to the polecat and the fox, he is much less cruel and sangui- 
nary, nor is he so well furnished as they are with the means 
of defence. 
In confinement he is tame and amiable, but uncleanly and 
disagreeable. When attacked in the woods, and finding no 
other means of escape he rolls himself into a ball, and if on 
a tree, will fall to the ground and pretend to be dead, though 
