116 
CARNIVORA. 
are more or less tuberculated on the inner; a cha- 
racter which indicates a slight approach to the use 
of a vegetable diet, as it enables them, though in a 
small degree, and very clumsily, to masticate this 
sort of food. 
The last or molar tooth takes a direction inwards 
with the other cheek-teeth, and exposes a very large 
and flat surface. The reversed figure of the upper 
jaw, in the opposite plate, is intended to exhibit it. 
The corresponding tooth to this in the cat tribe, 
which has been called the auxiliary carnivorous or 
cheek-tooth, is much smaller, is placed more on an 
inclined plane in the mouth, and seems destined to 
receive the cutting edge of that opposite to it; 
whence it cannot act as a molar or grinding tooth, 
but merely as facilitating the cutting operation. But 
the large, flat tooth of the weasels is met by a corre- 
sponding flat surface in the opposite teeth of the 
lower jaw; the last of which is small, and perfectly 
flat : the third lobe, also, of the last but one, or 
largest, is flat, and both these flat surfaces are 
brought into contact with the opposite flat tooth 
before described ; so that, if any substance be placed 
between them when the mouth is about to close, it 
will be squeezed or pounded ; while any thing placed 
on the flat tooth of the felinae would be exposed to 
the action of the cutting edge of its opposite, and 
consequently be divided, and not pounded. 
The weasels are very slender and long, and pos- 
sess a peculiar pliability of body, which enables them 
to pass through very narrow and winding apertures ; 
