THE HONEY RATEL 
perfume serves the purpose of a protection against 
enemies. For instance, should a ratel be attacked 
and hard pressed it discharges a quantity of this 
evil-smelling fluid, which nauseates its foe. If a 
leopard, cheetah, or lion should pounce upon a ratel, 
thinking to make a meal of it, all the ratel need do 
is to excrete a little of its special perfume, stored 
up for such occasions, and its enemy drops it in 
disgust. 
However, like the Striped Muishond, the ratel 
in captivity when kindly treated never ejects 
this fluid, and the animal in consequence is 
odourless. 
In front of Jeannie’s cage is a donation-box 
bearing an inscription as follows: “It costs six- 
pence a day to feed me, and I am told if I am not 
self-supporting I will not be allowed to live. Please 
give me a penny, sir.” She seems to have some 
idea what this box is for. When a visitor approaches 
her cage she croons and makes a variety of coaxing 
noises which might be termed ratel language. Then 
stretching out a fore paw she claws the slit in the 
box, indicating as plainly as possible that she 
expects the visitor to drop a coin into the box. 
She has not been trained to do this. Observing 
visitors drop coins through this slit in the box, 
and the jingling sound of the money evidently 
being pleasant to her sense of hearing, she now 
tries to attract attention to the box. The contents 
of this box are collected once a week, and during 
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