On the generation of the marsupial animals; with a description of the impregnated uterus of the kangaroo

Abstract

The author gives a history of the opinions which have been advanced relative to the generative organs and functions of the Marsupiata , an extensive order of quadrupeds, including animals nourished by every variety of food, and exercising very different powers of progression, yet exhibiting a remarkable uniformity in their mode of reproduction. In all the genera included in this family, the uterus is double; in most of them the vagina is also double; and there is always a single cloacal outlet for the excrementitious substances, and the products of generation. There is a corresponding uniformity in the male organs, which are bifurcated at the extremity, and have a double groove for the transmission of the semen; and the male has not only marsupial bones, similar to those of the female, but also a muscle, similar to that which surrounds and compresses the mammary gland in the female, winding round these bones like pulleys, and acting as cremasters for the retraction and compression of the testes.