NEW GUINEA PERAMELES. 
389 
The present genus was' founded by Mr. Ogilby upon a 
singular little animal discovered by Sir Thomas Mitchell on 
the banks of the Biver Murray. The animal was presented 
to the Natural History Museum at Sydney, but a careful 
drawing, and some notes, were brought to England, and upon 
these Mr. Ogilby’s account is drawn up. More recently, 
specimens of the Choeropus have been procured by Mr. Gould' 
and by Capt. G. Grey, and are now deposited in the British 
Museum. From these we learn that Mr. Ogilby’s original 
conjecture as to the affinities of the animal, is correct—that it 
is allied to Perameles. The structure of the skull and teeth 
is very nearly the same as in Perameles. In the number of 
the teeth I have good reason to believe Choeropus does not 
differ from Perameles 1 . The five incisor teeth on each side 
of the upper jaw are contiguous, and rather less compressed 
than in Perameles, being slightly convex on the outer 
surface, and their apices are not truncated as in the species 
of the genus just mentioned, but terminate in a somewhat 
obtuse point. The canine is rather small, but comparatively 
broad from front to back, and is formed nearly like the 
premolars: it is distant about three quarters of a line from the 
incisors. The first false molar is separated from the canine 
by a space of 1^ lines, and from the second false molar 
by about three quarters of a line; the second and third 
false molars, and the four true molars, form a continuous (or 
very nearly continuous) series. These teeth, as represented 
in the drawing kindly lent me by Prof. Owen, do not appear 
to differ in structure from those of Perameles. With regard 
to the teeth of the lower jaw, I have only to remark, that the 
incisors are broader (the liindermost one distinctly so) than 
in Perameles. 
The cranium is shorter, and the cerebral portion is broader, 
1 The only teeth which 1 have not seen are the back molars of the lower 
jaw. 
