BEAVER LODGES AND BURROWS. 159 



rows are then deep below the surface of the water, 

 the security of their habitations is not endangered 

 until the river again subsides in the fall, when 

 they are again reconstructed. I saw a number of 

 these lodges between the Yellowstone River and the 

 Rocky Mountains, in June, 1862, which had with- 

 stood the great freshet of that year; and made the 

 above sketch of one of them. The entrances or pas- 

 sage-ways often extend back twenty feet into the 

 bank, and each communicates with one or more under- 

 ground chambers which are always found near the 

 surface. Trappers who have opened them describe 

 the chambers as small, but neatly formed and clean. 

 Lodges are occasionally seen upon the river banks and 

 upon the bottom lands, but from the extent of the 

 cutting among the cottonwood-trees, which sometimes 

 lay in piles upon each other, it is evident that most 

 of the beavers inhabit the river banks. 



Whether beaver lodges ever have more than one 

 chamber is a question. It has been stated that two 

 have been found, in some instances, one above the 

 other. I have opened a large number of these lodges 

 in dissimilar situations, and never found but one with 

 two chambers, and these were upon the opposite sides 

 of a fallen tree, over which the lodge was constructed. 

 The chambers communicated with each other by 

 water, though not directly. In some cases three or 

 four lodges have been found in a cluster, and so near 

 together as to have a common roof; on opening which 

 it was ascertained that each had its separate passages 

 to the water, and no communication with the others. 

 They were separate lodges, built side by side, and 

 probably at different periods; and were turned into 



