ANIMALS'. 279 



of the weasel kind, which are chiefly found in America. All 

 the weasel kind, as was already observed, have a very strong 

 smell ; some of them indeed approaching to a perfume, but the 

 gi-eatest number most insupportably foetid. But the smell of our 

 weasels, and ermines, and polecats, is fragrance itself when com- 

 pared to that of the squash and the s/dnk, which have been called 

 the polecats of America. These two are found in different parts 

 of America, both differing in colour and fur, but both obviously 

 of the weasel kind, as appears not only from their figure and 

 odour, but also from their disposition. The squash is about the 

 size of a polecat, its hair of a deep brown, but principally differ- 

 ing from all of this kind in having only four toes on the feet be- 

 fore, whereas all the otJier weasels have five. The skink, which 

 I take to be Catesby's Virginia polecat, resembles a polecat in 

 shape and size, but particularly differs in the length of its hair 

 and colour. The hair is above three inches and a half long, and 

 that at the end of the tail above four inches. The colour is partly 

 black and partly white, variously disposed over the body, very 

 glossy, long, and beautiful. There seem to be two varieties more 

 of this animal, which Mr Buffon calls the conepale and the 

 zorille. He supposes each to be a distinct species : but as they 

 are both said to resemble the polecat in form, and both to be 

 clothed with a long fur of a black and white colour, it seems need- 

 less to make a distinction. The conepate resembles the skink 

 in all things except in size, being smaller, and in the disposition 

 of its colours, which are more exact, having five white strij)es 

 ipon a black ground, running longitudinally from the head ta 

 the tail. The zorille resembles the skink, but is rather smaller, 

 and more beautifully coloured, its streaks of black and white 

 being more distinct, and the colours of its tail being black at its 

 insertion and white at the extremity ; whereas in the skink they 

 are all of one gray colour. 



But whatever differences there may be in the figure or colour 

 of these little animals, they all agree in one common affection, 

 that of being intolerably foetid and loathsome. I have already 

 observed that all the weasel kind have glands furnishing an 

 odorous matter, near the anus, the conduits of which generally 

 have their aperture just at its opening. That substance which 

 is stored up in these receptacles, is in some of this kind, such as 

 in the martin already mentiotied, and also in the genet and the 



2 a2 



