Word: possum
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...pracbet). Nec quidem vos estis mihi practereundac, o amatrices dicaculae et sagaces, tu, M. Paludis Filum et tu, o matre forti filia fortior, M. Tabum; nec tu, dura Dersofia; nec vos, o nymphae graciles, meae Mariac ambae; nec denique tu, o vox aurea cuius nomen barbarum Latin vortere nondum possum, Abigail Lewis. Et vobis quoque contingat semper pro meritis corona--et vinum, o adulescentes facundi et procaces--tu, Carbo ardens, et vos, Rolande callide edaxque Scote, et tu, o Reducta Valles cui dolus est Diaboli...
Walt Kelly, creator of "Pogo," the possum from Okefenokee County, nominates this dignified man to be the next president of Harvard. Kelly describes him as "a composite of past and future...
...pupil and ought to be sharp at night, but even in daylight they are dim and dull. Only its hearing is keen (its thin ears curl over to keep out insects during sleep), and its bristling whiskers have a superfine sense of touch. On his short legs, the possum meanders in a slow, aimless shuffle. As a climber he shows his greatest skill, using his strong, ratlike tail and the opposing "thumb" on his hind feet to scrabble after autumn persimmons. He cannot hang by his tail as long as legend would have it, but he does "play possum" with...
Marsupial Secrets.The female possum's habit of licking her pouch before giving birth is the source of what Dr. Hartman considers several preposterous possum legends. But for all its stupidity, the possum, in its sex life, is much like other mammals. After only 12½ days' gestation, the mother props herself into a sitting position and delivers a large litter of tiny (20 can fit into a teaspoon), wormlike young. Still little more than squirming, pink embryos, the baby possums clamber upward over their mother's soft, warm underbelly and into the pouch that opens and closes...
...this prying into marsupial secrets, says Dr. Hartman, is more than idle curiosity or an effort to explain away old folklore. In the possum's pouch, science can study living embryos outside the womb. Thus, from the thick-witted possum, man may learn some lessons on how to care for his own premature young...