marsupial mouse

noun1

1. •
   (Australia) Any of several small carnivorous marsupials of the family Dasyuridae, especially in the genera Sminthopsis and Antechinus.

   • The Surgeon cut me short with a fierce uplift of his beetle brow—and for a dreadful moment I feared two of the many marsupial mice in my cell had leapt up onto his face […]. — 2011