FERRET
—is a useful little animal, well known to WARRENERS and RAT-CATCHERS, by whom they are principally bred, as necessary to their own occupations. The ferret is of great spirit, strength, and courage, for its size; is an inveterate enemy to rabbits, rats, and poultry; in the pursuit of which, it will encounter any difficulty or danger, when once put upon the scent. The body is longer in proportion to its height, than almost any other animal, the weazel and stoat excepted. The colour frequently varies, even in the young of the same dam and the same litter; some being black, with white under the belly; some are of a faint straw-colour yellow, and others of a light sandy red. The head is, in its formation, not unlike the mouse; the eyes are small, fiery, having the appearance of red-hot iron, and can consequently distinguish objects in the dark. It has a natural and instinctive propensity to burrowing, and where-ever the head can enter, the rest of the body can easily follow. Whenever the FERRET has secured the prey he is in pursuit of, he extracts the blood with extreme pleasure by suction, but is totally indifferent to the flesh; with the exception of the head of either RABBIT or RAT, the skull of which he directly destroys with his teeth, the better to enjoy an instantaneous and luxurious feast upon the brains.
The FERRET usually produces five or six young at each litter, after a gestation of forty days: the offspring continue blind for thirty days, and copulate in six weeks after they can see. They are not ravenous, (except in pursuit of their prey, after having been long fasted;) are easily supported upon bread, milk, and similar trifles, enabled by nature to exist a long time without food, which is in some degree compensated for by their great enjoyment of sleep. When used in WARRENS, they are hunted with muzzles, that they may alarm the RABBITS, and drive them from their burrows to the nets, without having the power to injure them; for if they were enabled to seize them under ground, they could never be prevailed upon to leave the earths.