378 



Inland Water Culture 



drew them to the place where a dam was to be con- 

 structed. He piled them as a framework for a dam, 

 weighted them in position with stones, filled the inter- 

 stices with trash and leafage and covered the water 

 side over completely with mud, making it impervious. 

 And when the water had risen behind it he built him a 

 dome-shaped house on the edge of the pond thus 

 created, having passageways opening beneath the 

 water, and he plastered it over with mud. When 

 marsh plants grew about the edges of the lands he had 

 thus inundated, he cut channels through them for easy 

 passage to his favorite feeding grounds. His staple 

 food was the bark of aspens and birches that grew 

 thickly near at hand, but this he varied with succulent 

 shoots and tubers of aquatics. These nature planted 

 for him, as soon as he had prepared his water-garden. 

 This was aboriginal water culture. 



f 







I'/:-: . i : 



FIG. 226. An aboriginal water-garden. A beaver dam and pond. (From Morgan.) 



