in my opinion, to be applied to the cat, and not to a species of Mustela, although Phædrus* has, on this occasion, translated the word go by that of Mustela. La Fontaine, indeed, who has translated Æsop, makes a true cat the hero of his apologue, and it is a somewhat remarkable thing that the French poet should have better determined the sense of the Greek word and the kind of animal than the Latin translator. The other fable of Esop's, in which an officious angos, at a time when the poultry-yard was attacked by an epidemic disease, disguises itself as a physician, and goes to offer its services with the design of devouring them, paints in a very natural manner the perfidious manners and treachery of the cat, and at the same time proves, in opposition to the assertion of the naturalists above mentioned, that the animal in question must have been subjected for some time to domestication before its tricks, its habits, and its character, could have been observed. Now, if I have proved that the cat was known in Egypt, China, India, Judæa, and Chaldea, at the most remote period, it becomes probable that Greece and Asia also possessed that animal; but they then imposed upon it another name yɑλñ, a generic name which they, in like manner, gave to several species of Mustela and to a Viverra. It is my object now to unravel the confusion caused by this homonomy, to distinguish in the descriptions of the ancients the different species of yaλñ or Mustela, to recognize the cat under all these names by the characteristic traits which are peculiar to it; and I trust, if some attention be lent to me, I shall succeed in solving the riddle. When agriculture and civilization advanced, and men became sensible of the inconveniencies resulting from the too great multiplication of a species, they would naturally devise means of destroying it, and guarding themselves against its attacks. Rats, mice, and other glires of a like nature, appear from the earliest times of history, and even of fable. Poisons, traps, and machines adapted for destroying these noxious animals were not yet invented, and there were then more forests, copses, and retreats for them than now. Man would naturally employ ani * iv. 1. 1. mals for enabling him to get rid of this pest. How should he not have sought to tame the cat, which is their cruelest enemy, and which could not fail to be the most powerful auxiliary of man in this active, perpetual, and daily warfare? The mythological traditions* which relate, that, during the war of Typhon, the gods fled into Egypt, and metamorphosed themselves into various animals; Apollo into a hawk, Diana into a cat, Latona into a mouse, confirm the antiquity of the existence of the cat and of glires in Egypt and Greece. But, as I have said, the cat at this period bore the name of yaλn. This is the opinion of Henri Etienne + and Coray, who, nevertheless, err in applying it only to the weazel and cat, while it also designates generically various species of canivorous animals of the genus Mustela, tamed by the ancients and associated by them with the cat in the destruction of glires. We have seen that Herodotus, Aristotle, Ælian, Diodorus, and the fables of Esop give the name ages to the cat, whether wild or tame. At a later period, when the Latin. name catus, xarros, prevailed among the Greeks, as designative of the domestic cat, the name ages was applied to the wild cat. At a little later period, the domestic cat resumed the name of yaλñ, which had been its original name at the commencement of lite rature. The word yaλs, which occurs three times in the Batrachomyomachia must, in my opinion, have been applied to the cat, and even to the domestic cat. This is also the opinion of have been combated by Henri Etienne and Barnes §, who Perizonius ||, Perotto, Philonenus Conradus and Lycius. The synonymy of the words yaxin and ages, and the designation of the cat by Homer under the name of yaλen, will be fixed by comparing a verse of Callimachus ¶ with another of the Batrachomyomachia, of which the former is an imitation, or to which it evidently alludes. Homer makes one of his rats say, πλεῖστον δὲ γαλέην περιδείδια, it is the yaλ that I fear most; and Callimachus says, "that Apollodor. I. vi. 3. beral, cap. 28. + Under the word yaañ. Apud Æliar, xiv. 4. Hygin. cap. 196. Ovid. Met. v. 330. Anton. Li Erysichton, in his horrible hunger, devoured his mules, oxen, horses, και τῶν διλερον, τῶν ἔτριμε θηρία μικρα, the cat dreaded by small animals, in short, all that was in Triopas's house." We also find under the name of yaxin, in a proverb cited by Theocritus, the cat, which his cotemporary Callimachus calls ἄλωρος. The common saying, ἅι γαλέαι μαλακώς χρήζονται κατεὺδην, cats like to sleep on soft beds, retraces one of the habits of the cat most frequently observed. It seeks soft beds, pillows, and couches *. Some learned men have applied this proverb to the weasel, but it does not paint the habits of that wild species which lives in the bushes, thorns, and heaps of fire-wood, and whose nests, which I have several times found, are in trunks of trees, and formed of straws, hay, or hard and dry plants. Buffon's experiment of the weasel †, which, being shut up in a cage with some cotton, squatted whenever one went near it, does not prove that that species naturally seeks a soft bed, like the cat, but is accounted for by the distrust innate in these feeble carnivorous animals, which leads them to conceal themselves and seek shelter, whenever they see the approach of an enemy stronger than themselves. Observations connected with the Migration of the Herring and Mackerel, as noticed in the British Channel. By Major W. M. MORRISON. Communicated by the Author, HASTINGS, from its peculiar situation, is well suited for a fishing station, and has, in consequence, for a considerable period, employed many vessels in this particular branch of commerce. Each vessel is furnished with from one hundred to one hundred and twenty nets, each net being forty feet in length. They can be joined to each other with great facility; and, when in the sea, present a curtain from fourteen to sixteen feet in depth. These the fishermen, when at any distance from the land, always shoot or place north and south, or as near that direction as can be done conveniently, in order that they may drift with the flowing and ebbing of the tide, which takes the Dict. d'Hist. Nat. viii. 208. + Hist. Nat. Anim. art. Belette, Y direction of east and west in this part of the British Channel. I have been particular in noticing this latter circumstance, as there is a singularity attached to the capture of both the herring and the mackerel, which is, that those fish which are encumbered with roes, while caught in great numbers on the east side of the nets, are not met with in a greater proportion than one in about one hundred without roes on the west side; a fact which (abstractedly from other sources of information on this subject), affords evidence, that not only the herring, but also the mackerel, reach this part of the Channel, for the purpose of depositing their roes, from the eastward. When the nets are arranged for the mackerel, the upper parts are always supported on the surface by small kegs and corks; but when placed for the taking of herrings, they are not always left near the surface, but are sunk at various depths when there is little or no wind, from within a yard of the bottom upwards, according to the judgment of the fishermen, but they generally prefer placing them near the surface when there is a brisk breeze. The herrings generally appear off Hastings about the beginning of November. Their approach, however to this latitude is earlier in some seasons; if, for instance, the wind sets in from the north-west in the beginning or middle of October, which naturally occasioning smooth water along the eastern coast of England, greatly facilitates the advances of the herrings southward; and should the wind continue in the same point for some time after the close columns of these fish reach the Channel, this insures a profitable season to the fishermen of this place. But should a south or south-east wind come on and prevail for some time, while the herrings are on their passage to the Channel, the swell often produced from these points disturbing the fish, operates powerfully towards changing their direction in seeking shelter on the coasts of Holland and France, and avoiding the southern coast of England. This was the case last season, which proved very unsuccessful to those engaged in the fishery. During the presence of the herrings and mackerel in this latitude, their eggs may, during a calm, be seen floating on the surface of the water like sawdust, amidst an appearance like the wake or track of a vessel, from which the course of the fish may be traced. The herrings generally disappear in this part of the Channel about the beginning of December, and during their transit along this coast, are subject, as well as the mackerel, to a very formidable enemy in the dog-fish, which have greatly encreased within the last thirty years. One column of herrings may be assailed with these in great numbers, while other columns may be without them. The fishermen, however, consider the dogfish too constant in their attendance on these occasions, as they frequently know to their cost, from having their nets greatly injured by their quick-cutting teeth. The dog-fish, like the shark, turns on its side when it seizes its prey, and greatly resembles that ravenous fish in many respects; and whenever it finds itself entangled in the net, disengages itself in a few seconds, by making a large incision, and passes through, liberating probably many herrings at the same time. The dog-fish, in attacking the herrings, devour them to repletion. They then disgorge what they have swallowed with such voracity, which being completed, they lose no time in recommencing seizing and swallowing the herrings with as much avidity as if it had been their first repast after a long abstinence, till they are again full, when their stomachs are again speedily relieved, and this filling and emptying has continued with such perseverance as to exhaust the patience of the most curious observer. This process, when carried on by numbers of the dog-fish about the nets, occasions a white shining appearance on the surface of the sea, accompanied with a smoothness, as if a quantity of oil had been strewed on it, emitting a rank oleaginous smell, which may be detected at some dis tance. An idea may be formed of the numbers of the dog-fish which too frequently visit this part of the Channel, when it is stated, that, in the latter end of October, in the year 1827, some fishermen proceeded to a small sand-bank, which is situated about four miles to the eastward of Hastings, and two miles from the land, in quest of cod-fish, and for this purpose shot lines, to which four thousand hooks were attached, over the ground. These, at the expiration of about half an hour, were examined, |