EXPLANATORY INDEX. 459 



protected by an evil odour^ Water ton always treats it With. 

 contempt. In an essay on the weasel, he has the following 

 I'emarks : — 



" Many of the weasel tribe have the power of emitting a 

 very disagreeable odour from the posterior part of the body. 

 We are gravely informed in the American Biography of Birds, 

 that the pole-cat has this faculty ' given him by nature as a 

 defence.' And, pray, at what old granny's fireside in the 

 United States has the writer of this picked up such an im- 

 portant piece of information'? How comes the polecat to be 

 aware that the emitted contents of a gland (I use gland in 

 the singular number, for the sake of brevity, but the animal 

 has two glands), inoffensive to itself, should be offensive to all 

 its pursuers ? I say, inoffensive to itself, because I cannob 

 believe that our Creator would condemn an unoffending animal 

 to produce its own punishment by means of a smell which 

 never leaves it — whether it roam up and down as a solitary 

 animal, or whether it have a partner and a family of young 

 ones to provide for. 



" Although this odour from individuals of the weasel tribe 

 is very distressing to our own nasal sensibilities, it by no 

 means follows that the scent should have a similar effect upon 

 those of all other animals. For example, the smell from 

 purulent carrion is certainly very disagreeable to us bipeds ; 

 still it cannot prove so to the dog — for, in lieu of avoiding it, 

 this quadruped never loses an opportunity of rolling in it. 

 If the polecat has had the fetid gland * given him by nature 

 as a defence,' then must nature have given a sweet one to the 

 civet for its destruction ; seeing that, whilst we shun the first 

 on account of its insupportable stench, we pursue and kill tlie 

 last in order to obtain its perfume. Now, as both these 

 animals are of the same family, I cannot help remaiking, with 

 Sterne, in the case of the 'poor negro giil,' that nature has 

 put one of this tribe sadly over the head of the others, if the 

 North American theory be sound. 



" Again, if nature has given this abominable stench to 



