NATURAL HISTORY of NORWAY. aj 



with thick legs, very fliarp claws, and teeth ; and he has the 

 boldnefs to attack every thing he can poffibly conquer among other 

 creatures. Shiffero fays, that he fiflies in the water ; but in that 

 he is contradicted by Hr. P. Hogftrom, in his Defcription of 

 Lapmarck, p. m. 372. He is blacky variegated with brown 

 and yellowifh ftreaks : his Ik in mines like damaik j it is covered 

 with foft hair, and is very precious* and is well worth the hunts- 

 man's while to kill them without firing* or wounding the fkin 7 

 tho' difficult : they fhoot him with a bow and blunt wooden 

 arrows, that the fkin, which is the only thing that is valuable, 

 may not be cut. The beft opportunity of catching him, is when 

 he, according to his cuftom when gorged, preffes and fqueezes 

 himfelf between two trees which ftand near together. By this 

 practice he eafes and exonerates his ftomach, which has not time 

 to digeft what he has fo voracioufly fwallowed. 



If this creature finds a carcafe fix times as big as himfelf, he 

 does not leave off eating as long as there is a mouthful left ; he 

 muft therefore be tormented with fuch an infatiable hunger, that 

 even a cramm'd belly does not abate it 5 and for this reafon he is 

 obliged to eafe himfelf by the artifice I have mentioned. 



Perhaps he is created for a moral picture, or an emblem of thofe 

 people, of whom the Apoftle fays, That their belly is their 

 God *. 



SECT. XIL 



f Haaren, which is alfo hunted on account of it's Jkin, is like a Maar - 

 great brown foreft cat. The head or fnout is rather (harper, and 

 more pointed ; under it's belly it is of a dark but Ihining yellow, 

 with a fine glofs ; but thofe which have this in perfection are 

 fcarce: their bite is bad, and they fmell very difagreeably ; they 

 hide themfelves in hollow trees, and fubfift by catching wild 

 mice or birds ; after which laft they'll jump from one branch of 

 the tree to another. There are two forts of them; the Efpe 

 Maar, which is the biggeft, and of the lighted colour; and the 

 Birke Maar, fmalleft and darkeft ; this is the fcarceft. 



* A friend of mine, a man of probity, has aflured me from ocular demonftration, 

 that when the Jerven is catched alive, (which feldom happens) and is chained to a ftone 

 wall, his hunger does not decline the Hones and mortar > but that he'll eat himfelf into 

 the wall. He is a greedy, but by no means a nice creature \ he eats all that he 

 can get. 



f The Marten, a creature alfo of the weafcl kind. The Martes of authors ; called 

 alio^asyna: and by Linnaeus, Muftela fulvo nigricans gula pallida. 



SECT. XIII. 



