WEASEL KIND. 79 



which they make themselves a warm bed, that 

 serves to defend them from the rigour of the cli- 

 mate. They sleep almost continually, and the 

 instant they awake, they seem eager for food. 

 They are usually fed with bread and milk. They 

 breed twice a-year. Some of them devour their 

 young as soon as brought forth, and then become 

 fit for the male again. Their number is usually 

 from five to six at a litter; and this is said to con- 

 sist of more females than males. Upon the whole, 

 this is an useful, but a disagreeable and offensive 

 animal ; its scent is fetid, its nature voracious, 

 it is tame without any attachment, and such is its 

 appetite for blood, that it has been known to at- 

 tack and kill children in the cradle. It is very 

 easy to be irritated ; and, although at all times 

 its smell is very offensive, it then is much more 

 so ; and its bite is very difficult of cure. 



To the ferret kind we may add an animal which 

 M. Buffon calls the Vansire, the skin of which 

 was sent him stuffed from Madagascar. It was 

 thirteen inches long, a good deal resembling the 

 ferret in figure, but differing in the number of 

 its grinding teeth, which amounted to twelve, 

 whereas in the ferret there are but eight : it dif- 

 fered also in colour, being of a dark brown, and 

 exactly the same on all parts of its body. Of 

 this animal, so nearly resembling the ferret, we 

 have no other history but the mere description of 

 its figure ; and in a quadruped whose kind is so 

 strongly marked, perhaps this is sufficient to satis- 

 fy curiosity. 



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