HISTORY AND HABITS OF THE WOLVERENE. 55 



animal had made water and left his dirt ; this I knew was his 

 ■cache. Using one of my snowshoes for a spade I dug into the 

 hillock and down to the ground, the snow being about four feet 

 deep ; and there I found my trap, with the toes of a rabbit still 

 in the jaws. Could it have been the animal's instinctive im- 

 pulse to hide prey that made him carry my trap so far merely 

 for the morsel of meat still held in it ? Or did his cunning 

 nature prompt him to hide the trap for fear that on some 

 future unlucky occasion he might put his own toes in it and 

 share the rabbit's fate ^ " 



This propensity of the Wolverene to carry off traps receives 

 confirmation from other sources. In Captain Cartwright's 

 Journal (ii, 407), a similar instance is recorded in the follow- 

 ing terms : — " In coming to the foot of Table Hill I crossed 

 the track of a Wolvering with one of Mr. Callingham's traps 

 on his foot : the foxes had followed his bleeding track. As this 

 beast went through the thick of the woods, under the north 

 side of the hill, where the snow was so deep and light that it 

 was with the greatest difS.culty I could follow him even on In- 

 dian rackets, I was quite puzzled to know how he had con- 

 trived to prevent the trap from catching hold of the branches 

 of trees or sinking in the snow. But on coming up with him I 

 discovered how he had managed : for after making an attempt 

 to fly at me, he took the trap in his mouth and ran upon three 

 legs. These creatures are surprisingly strong in proportion to 

 their size 5 this one weighed only twenty-six pounds and the 

 trap eight ; yet including all the turns he had taken he had 

 carried it six miles." 



The ferocity of the Wolverene, no less than its cunning, is 

 illustrated in some of the endless occasions on which it matches 

 its powers against those of its worst enemy. A man had set a 

 gun for a Carcajou which had been on his usual round of dem- 

 olition of Marten traps. The animal seized the bait unwarily, 

 and set off the gun j but owing to careless or improper setting, 

 the charge missed or only wounded it. The Carcajou rushed 

 upon the weapon, tore it from its fastenings, and chewed the 

 stock to pieces. It is added to the account of this exploit that 

 the beast finished by planting the barrel muzzle downward up- 

 right in the snow ; but this may not be fully credited. The 

 stories that pass current among trappers in the North would 

 alone fill a volume, and they are quite a match for those that 

 •Olaus Magnus set down in his book centuries ago. How much 



