ANIMALS. 285 



matters, which diiniiiisli its value, but increase its weight. 

 The quantity which a single animal affords, generally depends 

 upon its health and nourishment. It gives more in proportion as 

 it is more delicately and abundantly fed. Raw tlesh bashed small, 

 eggs, rice, birds, young fowls, and particularly fish, are the kinds 

 of food the civet most delights in. These are to be changed and 

 altered, to suit and entice its appetite, and continue its health. It 

 gets but very little water ; and although it di inks but rarely, yet 

 it makes urine very frequently ; and, upon such occasions, we can- 

 not, as in other animals, distinguish the male from the female. 



The perfume of the civet is so strong that it communicates 

 itself to all parts of the animal's body ; the fur is impregnated 

 thereby, and the skin penetrated to such a degree that it con- 

 tinues to preserve the odour for a long time after it is stiipped off. 

 If a person be shut up with one of them in a close room, he 

 cannot support the perfume, which is so copiously diflused. 

 When the animal is irritated, as in all the weasel kind, its scent 

 is much more violent than ordinary ; and if it be tormented so 

 as to make it sweat, this also is a strong perfume, and serves to 

 adulterate or increase what is otherwise obtained from it. In 

 general, it is sold in Holland for about fifty shillings an ounce ; 

 although, like all other commodities, its value alters in propor- 

 tion to the demand. Civet must be chosen new, of a good con- 

 sistence, a whitish colour, and a strong disagreeable smell. 

 There is still a very considerable traific carried on from Bus- 

 sorah, Calicut, and other places in India, where the animal that 

 produces it is bred ; from the Levant also, from Guinea, and 

 especially from Brasil in South America, although Mr Buffon is 

 of opinion that the animal is a native only of the Old Continent, 

 and not to be found wild in the New. The best civet, how- 

 ever, is furnished, as was observed, by the Dutch, though not in 

 such quantities at present as some years past, when this per- 

 fume was more in fashion. Civet is a much more grateful pei- 

 fiime than musk, to which it has some resemblance ; and was 

 some years ago used for the same purposes in medicine. But, 

 at present, it is quite discontinued in prescription ; and persons 

 of taste or elegance seem to proscribe it even from the toilet. 

 Perfumes, like dress, have their vicissitudes; musk was in pe- 

 culiar repute, until displaced by civet ; both gave ground, upon 

 discovering the manner of preparing ambergrise ; and even this 



