Clifton College Scientific Society. 29 



been narrated about this have probably had their origin in 

 the smooth tracks observed to have been made all round the 

 houses by the Beaver's flat broad tail, and the flaps of it that 

 the animal is seen to make when leaping from the bank into 

 the water, or when excited by any cause. The entrance to 

 the lodge is invariably at some depth beneath the surface of 

 the water, — not on the very edge of the bank, but some little 

 way underneath it.^ There are usually, though not always, 

 two flats in each house — the lower being a mere waterway 

 intended to secure free and safe entrance to the upper one, 

 as also to raise it above floods.^ Four beavers generally 

 occupy a house ; sometimes only two. Each of them has a 

 separate bed of grass, and the passage of communication to 

 the waterway below is in the centre of the floor. There is 

 always a passage leading to the land as well. The houses 

 are occasionally joined externally, but are still perfectly sepa- 

 rated within. 



The food of the Beaver depends on the season : in summer 

 he eats roots,^ leaves and grass, but in winter he has to sub- 

 sist on the bark of various trees, especially the willow and 

 alder. There is but little nutritive matter in food of this 

 latter kind, and it is no wonder that the return of spring 

 finds the Beavers in a thin and emaciated condition. But 

 they soon recover their flesh again and seem none the 

 worse for their long enforced abstinence. A pile of sticks is 

 said by some writers to be invariably laid up under water 

 near the entrance of the lodge, so as to form a store for 

 winter consumption. Pieces of branches and often whole 

 trunks are, they say, submerged by means of stones and left 

 beneath the water till required. But this seems incredible, 

 for sticks placed in such a position must speedily decay, and 

 bark when rotten would not feed even a Beaver. Indeed it 

 is highly improbable that the animal lays by any store even 

 on dry land (as the majority of naturalists hold), for, in the 

 expressive words of Mr. Green,* ' one day's supply of sticks 

 for a single Beaver would fill a house ; and if a stick were 

 cut in the autumn, before the winter was over it would have 

 lost its sap, and would not be eaten by the Beaver.' 



The gnawing power of the Beaver's teeth is something 



' The trappers give the name of ' the angle' to the projecting ledge thus formed. 



^ This it does not always do. When the river becomes greatly swollen the 

 Beavers are often obliged to leave their lodges and seek shelter in burrows else- 

 where. 



^ That of the beautiful yellow ■^■&iiiV-\.\\y{Nup'karadvena)\i an especial favourite. 



* Op. cit. p. 362. 



