Crass I. RF. 4 bE Ee kr 
year, and bring eight young ones each time: ona 
fuppofition this happens regularly, during four 
years, their numbers will amount to 1,274,840. 
By this account, we might juftly apprehend 
being overftocked with thefe animals, if they had 
not a large number of enemies which prevents 
the too great increafe: not only men, but hawks, 
and beafts of prey, make dreadful havoke among 
the fpecies. Notwith{tanding thefe different ene- 
mies, we are told by Phy, and Strabo, that they - 
once proved fo great a nuifance to the inhabitants 
of the Balearic iflands, that they were obliged to im- 
plore the affiftance of a military force from the 
Romans, in the time of Auguftus, in order to extir- 
pate them *. Their native country is Spain, where 
they were taken by means of ferrets, as we do at 
prefent, which animals were firft introduced there 
out of Africa +: they love a temperate and a warm 
climate, and are incapable of bearing great cold, 
fo that in Sweden { they are obliged to be kept in 
houfes. Our country abounds with them; their 
furs form a confiderable article in the hat manu- 
factures; and of late, fuch part of the fur as is 
unfit for that purpofe, has been found as good as 
feathers for ftuffing beds and bolfters. Numbers 
of the fkins are annually exported intoChina. The 
Enghjfb counties that are moft noted for thefe ani- 
* Phi. lib. viti. c. 55. Strabo, lib. iii. 
+ Strabo, iil. 144. t Faun. Suec. 26. 
Vor, I. I mals 
Fv 
105 
