HAMLYN'S MENAGERIE MAGAZINE. 
Gabriel Sagard Theodat, who, in a " History of 
Canada," published: in 1636, calls it "Child of the 
Devil," and says that it bea:s the name of " Scan- 
garesse" among the Hurons. "This animal," he 
says, "besides having a very bad smell', is very 
spiteful, and ugly to look at; it is of the size of a 
cat or a young fox; its skin is covered with a 
rough and sooty coat, and its bushy tail likewise; 
in winter it hides under the snow, and does not 
come out till the new moon in March." 
In these few lines are condensed the charac- 
teristics of that group of the Weasels of the New 
World, to which Buff on has applied the general 
name cf Mouffettes (stiflers) by analogy with the 
asphyxiating gas of which the unique perfume of 
these beasts reminds one. They are better known 
to us by the name of Skunks, adopted by our 
furriers, a word derived from the name " Seecawk" 
which is given to them by a certain tribe of Red- 
skins, and has the same signification. 
The Skunks have the widest distribution on 
the American continent of all the Weasels. They 
differ considerably from all the other animals of 
the family and show an approach toi the Badgers. 
Their gait is not lively like that of the Beech and 
Pine Martens and the Weasels; they plod quietly 
through meadow and wood; nothing frightens or 
upsets them, and it is no doubt their confidence 
in the efficaciousness, of their means of defence 
which gives them this contempt of danger. When 
it sees the foe, the Skunk does not run away; it 
stops, turns to meet him, and hoists its colours in 
the shape of its bushy tail, the long waving hair 
of which hartgs over its back and envelopes it- 
like the folds of a flag. Its coolness reminds one 
of the calmness with which the Colonel of the 
Crequi-dragoon Regiment said to his officers, in 
one of those splendid eighteenth-century battles — 
so unlike the brutal butcheries of our days — " Gen- 
tlemen, tighten the ribbons of your pigtails and 
see your hats are on straight; we are to have the 
honour of charging!" But the Skunk does not 
charge; its dis-charges, and what it tightens up 
are not pigtail-ribbons ! 
In fact, its weapons are neither the powerful 
canines with which its jaws are armed, nor the 
sharp claws on its paws, but its anal glands which 
secrete, in their muscular pouches, a horrible; fluid 
which this beast can eject in the form of a spray 
to a distance of three metres, and possesses such 
a stench and is so irritating and acrid that the 
boldest enemy is put to flight by a few discharges. 
Unfortunately for the beast, it wears a fur which 
nude humanity looked on with envy, and in spite 
of the persistence of its repulsive scent, of which 
for a long time it proved impossible to get rid, 
Skunk-furs became the staple of a trade so impor- 
tant that we have seen the number imported rise 
from 1,265 skins which the Hudson Bav Company 
sold in Europe in 1849, to 12,583, for this Com- 
pany alone, in 1890. Other American companies 
who, altogether, put, in 1858, 10,136 skins on the 
market, supplied, ten years later, 678,199. 
In spite of being distributed over the whole 
extent of the United States and the southern parts 
of Canada, in spite of its extreme prolificacy, 
which reaches the number of a dozen young at 
each litter, the Skunk is, therefore, like the birds 
whose plumage is favoured by fashions, threatened 
with extermination. Naturally the idea has arisen 
of exploiting its economically and sensibly by 
domesticating it. The disposition of the beast 
favours this; it is not only, as I have been saying, 
not timid, but its boldness even leads it to ap- 
proach human habitations, and it has been ob- 
served that it particularly frequents cultivated 
land 1 , where it likes to make its earth under farm- 
buildings and sheds, a practice which, on account 
of the scent of the animal, is not always looked on 
with a very favourable eye by the occupants. 
The proximity of poultry-yards, and the scraps 
of all sorts thrown away about houses, no doubt 
have something to do with this taste; for, not 
having the activity and quickness of movement of 
most of the Weasles, the Skunk lives on mice, in- 
sects, grubs, fruit, and the eggs of birds which 
nest on the ground — on what it can get with the 
least trouble to itself, in short. 
It thus comes about that several years ago 
the practice of rearing Skunks in captivity began 
in the United States. Besides the diminution of 
the wild animals another reasons operated in 
favour of these experiments. By breeding, it was 
hoped to obtain furs of better quality and colour 
than those furnished by the trappers' pursuit. 
The beast, not being exposed to the inclemency 
of the weather, hunger, and other vicissitudes of 
a life of freedom, ought to furnish much finer 
pelts, of a quality which should satisfy the 
demands of the trade. 
The earliest ajttempts seem not always to 
have given good results, owing to want of ex- 
perience in the sort of treatment needed for the 
captive animals, and a certain establishment begun 
on a large scale twenty years ago in Pennsylvania 
wound up lamentably; but since that time methods 
have been perfected, and one of the chief authori- 
ties on fur-bearing animals, Mr. Seton, of Con- 
necticut, considers that Skunk-farming is the 
most likely branch of the industry to give remuner- 
ative results. Nowadays there are several Skunk- 
farms which handle two or three hundred animals. 
Skunk-farms are managed in much the same 
way as the Fox-farms about which I have already 
spoken; that is to say, the animals have their 
liberty in fairly extensive enclosures, while at the 
same time they are under the control of the 
breeder. These enclosures are made as much as 
possible on dry soils — sandy or rocky, but not on 
chalk land; the ground must be porous, to avoid 
water-logging, but it is all the better if watered 
by a running-stream and covered with bushes, 
