Their growth is very quick, and their lives but of short duration: they are very common throughout all the southern parts of Asia, from Egypt to Java; and are even to be met with in Africa, as far as the Cape of Good Hope; but they will not live and produce in our temperate climates; they are distressed by wind, and the frost destroys them; to avoid the one, and to counteract the effects of the other by warmth, they roll themselves up with their heads under their bellies. The ichneumon was much esteemed by the ancient Egyptians, and is still protected with much care upon account of the essential service it performs in the destruction of noxious animals, particularly the crocodiles, whose eggs it knows how to discover even in the sand, and which creatures would become very formidable, from their great multiplication, one female laying near five hundred eggs, if it were not that the ichneumons destroy them. THE FOSSANE. This animal is called by some travellers the _genet of Madagascar_, because it resembles the genet in colour, and some other affinities; but it is in general much smaller, and has not the odoriferous bag, which is an essential character belonging to that animal. As we were not certain as to this fact, not being able to procure one for dissection, we wrote to M. de Poivre, who had sent us the skin of a fossane stuffed, and who favoured us with the following answer:--Lyons, July 19, 1761. "The fossane which I brought from Madagascar is an animal whose manners are much like those of our marten. The inhabitants of the island assured me, that when the male is in heat it emits a very strong smell like musk. When I stuffed the skin which is in the royal gardens I did not discover any bag, nor did I find any odoriferous smell. I reared two similar animals, the one at Cochinchina, and another in the Phillippine Islands; they were both males; I had them very young, and kept them about, two or three months, in which time they had become pretty familiar. I never found any bag in the parts you speak of, but only observed that their excrements had the same smell as those of our marten. They eat flesh and fruits, but preferred the latter, and were exceedingly partial to bananas, which they devoured with voracity. This is a very wild animal, and difficult to tame; though taken when very young, yet it preserved the look and character of ferocity, which appeared to me somewhat extraordinary in an animal who feeds by preference on fruits. The eye of the fossane represents a large black globe, in comparison with the size of its head, which gives it a mischievous aspect." It gives us great pleasure to have here an opportunity of testifying our thanks to M. de Poivre, who from a real taste for natural history, and a friendship for those who cultivate it, has presented to the cabinet a great number of scarce and curious animals.