ORDER CARNASSIER. 383 



We have already ventured to express an opinion against 

 the needless multiplication of specific distinctions, founded 

 upon trivial, and merely external differences. A better 

 place for a reiterated expression of the same opinion can 

 hardly be, than after the description just given of the 

 Civet and the Zibeth. Here we have seen two animals, 

 in size, in form, and in organic structure, precisely similar. 

 Their habits, too, as far as we can observe, are exactly the 

 same, — both use the same food, both are great sleepers, 

 and both are nocturnal. What then is the difference be- 

 tween them? A very slight variation in the shades of 

 their colours, and in the mode of their arrangement. Is 

 this a sufficient ground of specific distinction ? If it be, 

 then assuredly the Negro and the European are different 

 species. The particulars in which they differ from each 

 other are far more numerous and important than the 

 variations of the Zibeth and the Civet. The fact is, that 

 no certain and universally applicable criterion, by which 

 species is to be distinguished from variety, has been yet 

 discovered. The want of such a criterion is more espe- 

 cially felt in the classification of the minor tribes. As 

 specific distinctions are the arbitrary creation of man, 

 perhaps such a criterion cannot be found. At all events, 

 in the case of multitudes of animals, we are working in the 

 dark. Ages of observation will probably be insufficient to 

 establish any thing completely determinate on the subject. 



Dr. Horsfield has figured and described the Viverra 

 Basse, the Rasse of the Javanese, as another species of the 

 first sub-division of the Viverra, i. e., the Civets, properly 

 speaking. If the Civet and the Zibet be with propriety 

 treated as mere varieties, the former of the African, and 

 the latter of the Asiatic world, the Rasse, according to 

 Doctor Horsfield's description, would appear to us to stand 

 in the same degree of relationship as a Javanese variety. 

 It is, indeed, almost painful so frequently to have occasion 



