Observations on certain parts of the animal oeconomy. Inclusive of several papers from the Philosophical transactions, etc / by John Hunter ... With notes by Richard Owen.
- John Hunter
- Date:
- 1840
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Observations on certain parts of the animal oeconomy. Inclusive of several papers from the Philosophical transactions, etc / by John Hunter ... With notes by Richard Owen. Source: Wellcome Collection.
480/494 page 472
![some species of one tribe partaking of similar properties with a species of another tribe. e Of the Kangaroo.* This animal (probably from its size) was the principal one taken notice of in this island; the only parts at first brought home were some skins and skulls, and I was favoured with one of the skulls from Sir Joseph Banks. As the teeth of such animals as are already known in some degree point out their digestive organs, I was in hopes that I might have been able to form an opinion of the parti- cular iribe of the animals already known to which the kangaroa should belong ; but the teeth did not accord with those of any one class of animals I was acquainted with, therefore I was obliged tc wait with patience till I could get the whole; and in many of its other organs the deviation from other animals is not less than in its teeth. In its mode of propagation it very probably comes nearer to the opossum than any other animal, although it is not at all similar to it in other respects. Its hair is of a grayish-brown colour, similar to that of the wild rabbit of Great Britain, is thick and long when the animal is old; but it is late in growing, and when only begun to grow it is like a strong down; however, in some parts it begins earlier than others, as about the mouth, &c. In all the young kan- garoos yet brought home (although some as large as a full-grown rat) they have all the marks of a foetus: no hair; ears lapped close over the head; no marks on the feet of having been used in progressive motion: the large nail on the great toe sharp at the point, and the sides of the mouth united something like the eyelids of a puppy just whelped, having only a passage at the anterior part. This union of the two lips on the sides is of a particular structure ; it wears off as it grows up, and by the time it is the size of a small rabbit, disappears. Of the Teeth of the Kangaroo. The teeth of this animal are so singular that it isimpossible from them to say what tribe it is of. There is a faint mixture in them, corresponding to those of different tribes of animals. Take the mouth at large, respecting the situation of the teeth, it would class in some degree with the Scalpris dentata,t in a fainter degree with the horse and ruminants; and with regard to theline of direction of all the teeth, they are very like those-of the Sculpris dentata. The fore teeth in the upper jaw agree with the hog, and those in the lower, in number, with the Scalpris dentata, but with regard to * [The species here for the first time described is the Macropus major of oe Systems: several other species of the same genus have since been dis- covered. | fT [This tribe includes the rat, &e. (it corresponds to the order Glires of Linneus and the fodentia of Cuvier.)]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b33292292_0480.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
