DOG-HEADED THYLACINUS. 
461 
and almost impenetrable glens in the neighbourhood of the 
highest mountains of Van Diemen’s Land. The specimen 
from which his description was taken was caught in a trap 
baited with Kangaroo’s flesh : it remained alive but a few 
hours, having received some internal hurt whilst being 
secured. From time to time it uttered a short guttural cry, 
and it appeared exceedingly inactive and stupid, and, like 
the owl, had an almost continual motion of the nyctitant 
membrane of the eye. Kemains of an Echidna were found 
in the stomach of the animal. Mr. Gunn informs us that 
these animals are common only in the remoter parts of the 
colony, and are frequently caught at Woolnooth and the 
Hampshire Hills. They attack the sheep at night, but are 
occasionally seen during the day-time; upon which occasions, 
perhaps from imperfect vision, their pace is very slow. Mr. 
Gunn also observes that the Thylacinus sometimes attains so 
large and formidable a size that a number of dogs will not 
face it. That gentleman denies that the tail of the animal 
is compressed, as has been stated by some authors, and his 
observations do not confirm the aquatic habits which have 
been attributed to it. 
Prof. Owen, who has prepared a memoir upon the internal 
anatomy of the Thylacinus, found no marsupial bones in 
three of the specimens which he dissected, two of which were 
full-grown females, and the third a male; but in a large and 
old male he detected a few particles of the bone-salts in 
the centre of the fibro-cartilage. The pouch. Prof. Owen 
observes, is well developed in the female Tliylacine, and in 
one of the specimens dissected, four well developed teats, 
each four inches long, indicated that it had contained four 
young ones when, or shortly before, it was killed 1 . 
See Proceedings of the Zoological Society for December, 1843, p. 148. 
