198 THE AMERICAN BEAVER. 



apparent in many places. One of these burrows, that 

 nearest to the pond, is described with a diagram {supra, 

 page 163). 



At the distance of about seventy feet from the pond, 

 this canal widens out to five feet, and then bears a little 

 to the left. The engraving (Plate XX.) is from a photo- 

 graph taken from this point, and looking down toward 

 the pond. It shows the pond and about seventy-five 

 feet of the canal. The lodge is mostly concealed 

 behind the clump of small trees upon the right. The 

 engraving is inaccurate in one respect. It shows the 

 ground too much elevated above the level of the 

 water in the canal. 



There is one feature of this canal deserving of at- 

 tention. After the rising ground, and with it the 

 hard-wood trees, were reached at the point where it 

 branched, there was no very urgent necessity for the 

 branches. But their construction along the base of the 

 high ground gave them a frontage upon the canal of 

 two hundred and fifteen feet of hard-wood lands, thus 

 affording to them, along this extended line, the great 

 advantages of water transportation for their cuttings. 

 If we are to regard these extensions as a further 

 expression of their appreciation of the uses of a canal, 

 it must increase our estimate of their powers of reflec- 

 tion. "Instinct," as that unfortunate and blundering 

 term is understood by those who comprehend its mean- 

 ing, would have fully performed its office when the 

 canal had been carried to the point of contact with the 

 high ground. Any progress of the work beyond this 

 must be referable to the exercise of a free intelligence.^ 



^ The lodges upon this pond were of the usual size, measuring 

 from fourteen to sixteen feet over their summits, and from three 



