=item ${^ENCODING}
-The encoding used to interpret native eight-bit encodings to Unicode,
-see L<encode>. An opaque C<Encode::XS> object.
+The I<object reference> to the Encode object that is used to convert
+the source code to Unicode. Thanks to this variable your perl script
+does not have to be written in UTF-8. Default is I<undef>. The direct
+manipulation of this variable is highly discouraged. See L<encoding>
+for more details.
=item $OS_ERROR