Siberia, and that there is a great traffic carried on with them at Ustivaga, a town about 600 miles from Moscow. [Footnote M: Vide Pliny, lib. VIII. cap. 19.] [Footnote N: Ibid. VIII. c. 22, 23.] This animal, which as we have shewn, prefers the cold to the temperate climates, is one of those which might have passed from one continent to the other through the northern regions, and this is probably the reason why we find him a tenant of the northern parts of America. Travellers have described him in such a manner as to preclude all mistake; and besides its skin forms an article of commerce between Europe and America. The lynx of Canada, as we have already remarked, is only smaller and whiter than those of Europe, and it is from this difference in size that they have been distinguished with the appellation of _chat-cervier_, and been considered by our nomenclators as animals of a different species. Without pronouncing decisively upon this question we shall only observe, that to all appearance the lynxes of Canada and of Muscovy are of the same species, first because the difference in size is not very considerable, since it is almost relatively the same as that which takes place between all animals common to both continents; the wolf, fox, &c. being smaller in America than they are in Europe, it cannot be expected to be otherwise with the lynx. Secondly, because, even in the north of Europe, these animals are found to vary in size; and authors mention two kinds, the one large and the other small. Thirdly, because they equally require the same climate, are of the same dispositions, the same figure, differing only in size, and a few trifling particulars of colour, circumstances not sufficient to authorize our pronouncing them to be two distinct species. The lynx, of which the ancients have said his sight could penetrate opaque bodies, and whose urine possessed the properly of hardening into a precious stone, called Lapis Lyncurius, is an animal that never existed, any more than the properties attributed to him, except in fable. To the true lynx this imaginary one has no affinity but in name. We must not, therefore, following the example of most naturalists, attribute to the former, which is a real being, the properties of this imaginary one, the existence of which even Pliny himself does not seem disposed to believe, since he speaks of it as an extraordinary animal, and classes it with the sphynx, the pegasus, and other prodigies, or monsters, the produce of Ethiopia, a country with which the ancients were very little acquainted.