534 APPENDIX. 



the Arabian books ; neither is he without a name ; he has? 

 one by which he invariably paiTes in. every part of Africa, 

 where he exifts, which in all probability he has enjoyed as 

 long as the lion or the tiger have theirs. He is white, and 

 not rofe-coloured* ; he does not burrow in the earth, but 

 lives upon trees ; he is not the- jcrda, but has a tail, and his 

 genus is not a .dog; for he is no: fox. Here is a troop of er- 

 rors on one fubject, that would give any man a furfeit of 

 modern defcription, all anting from conceit, the cacocthcs ftri- 

 bendi) too great love of writing, without having been at the 

 pains to gain a Sufficient knowledge of the fubjeel; by fair, 

 inquiry and a very little reading,. 



The name- of" this quadruped all over Africa is El Fennec ; ■ 

 fuch was the name of that 1 iiril faw at Algiers ; fuch it is 

 called in the many Arabian books that have defcribed it. 

 But this name,, having no obvious fignification in Arabic, its 

 derivation has given rife to many ill-founded guefTes, and 

 laid it open to the conjectures of grammarians who were* 

 not naturalifts. Gollius fays, it is a weafel, and fo fay all 

 the Arabians. He calls it muftela famaria, the hay weafel, 

 from fcenum, hay, that being the materials of which he 

 builds his nefu But this derivation cannot be admitted, for 

 there is no fuch thing known as hay in the country where 

 the Fennec refides. But ftippofmg that the dry grafs in all 

 countries may be called hay, Hill fcenum, a Latin word, 

 would not "be that which would exprefs it in Africa. But 

 when we confider that long before, and ever after Alex- 

 ander's conqueft, down as low as the tenth century, the lan- 

 guage 



* Sparman, vol. II. p« 185, 



