Class I. RABBET. J05 



year, and bring eight young ones each time : on a 

 fuppofition this happens regularly, during four 

 years, their numbers will amount to 1,274,840. 



By this account, we might juftly apprehend 

 being overftocked with thefe animals, if they had 

 not a large number of enemies which prevents 

 the too great increafe : not only men, but hawks, 

 and beads of prey, make dreadful havoke among 

 the fpecies. Nocwithllanding thefe different ene- 

 mies, we are told by Pliny, and Strabo, that they 

 once proved fo great a nuifance to the inhabitants 

 of the Balearic iflands, that they were obliged to im- 

 plore the affiftance of a military force from the 

 Romans, in the time of Auguftus, in order to extir- 

 pate them *. Their native country is Spain, where 

 they were taken by means of ferrets, as we do at 

 prefent, which animals were firft introduced there 

 out o^ Africa f : they love a temperate and a warm 

 climate, and are incapable of bearing great cold, 

 fo that in Sweden % they are obliged to be kept in 

 houfes. Our country abounds with them-, their 

 furs form a confiderable article in the hat manu- 

 fa6i:ures; and of late, fuch part of the fur as is f u ji, 

 unfit for that purpofe, has been found as good as 

 feathers for (luffing beds and bolfters. Numbers 

 of the fkins are annually exported into China. The 

 Englijh counties that are moft noted for thefe ani- 



* PUn. lib. viii. C 55. Strabo, lib. iii. 



t Straboy iii. 144- I ^^''"* '^^^^' 26. 



' Vol. I. I "^^^s 



