THE animals belonging to this genus, notwithstanding their small size, are all carnivorous, and from their slender and lengthened bodies, short legs, and the very free motion in every direction, permitted by the loose articulations of the spine, are well formed for pursuing their prey into the deepest recesses. Constituted by nature to subsist on animals, many of which have great strength and courage, they possess an undaunted and ferocious disposition. The Weasel has a long and thin body; its length, with its tail, is ten inches, and its height not more than an inch and a half. In the northern parts of Europe they are very numerous. Mice of every description, the field and the water-vole, rats, moles, and small birds, are their ordinary food, and occasionally rabbits and partridges. When driven by hunger, it will boldly attack the poultry-yard. The Weasel, when it enters a hen roost, never meddles with the cocks or old hens, but makes choice of the pullets and young chickens; these it kills with a single stroke on the head, and carries away one after the other. It sucks the eggs with avidity, making a small hole at one end, through which it draws out the yolk. In winter it resides in granaries and hay-lofts, and in summer chooses the low lands about the mills and streams, where it hides among the bushes, and in the hollows of old trees. It was formerly supposed that the Weasel was untamable; but Buffon, in a supplementary volume, corrects this error, and from a letter of a female correspondent, shows that it may be rendered as familiar as a cat or a lapdog. It frequently eat from his correspondent’s hand, and seemed fonder of milk and fresh meat than of any other food. “If I present my hands,” says this lady, “at the distance of three feet, it jumps into them without ever missing. It shows a great deal of address and cunning, in order to accomplish its ends, and seems to disobey certain prohibitions merely through caprice. During all its actions it seems solicitous to divert and be noticed, looking at every jump and at every turn to see whether it be observed or not. If no notice be taken of its gambols, it ceases them immediately, and betakes itself to sleep; and when awaked from the soundest sleep, it instantly resumes its gaiety, and frolics about in as sprightly a manner as before. It never shows any ill humour, unless when confined or too much teased, in which case it expresses its displeasure by a sort of murmur, very different from that which it utters when pleased.” Weasels and ferrets are used by rat-catchers to drive the rats out of their holes; and they kill a great many, the habit of the Weasel being to kill its prey by biting the head, so that the teeth penetrate the brain, and then to throw the body aside, or hide it till a future period. [Illustration: THE FERRET, (_Mustela furo_,)]