3 o6 THE FUR TRADE OF AMERICA 



to the safe water as the hesitating mother would have them do, 

 all the little feet scrambling over the sand with the funny short steps 

 of a Chinese lady in tight boots. Maternal care proves stronger 

 than fear. The frightened mother follows the young otter and will 

 no doubt read them a sound lecture on land dangers when she has 

 rounded them back to the safe water higher up stream. 



Of all wild creatures, none is so crafty in concealing its lairs 

 as the otter. Where did this family come from ? They had not 

 been swimming up-stream ; for the man had been watching on the 

 river bank long before they appeared on the surface. Stripping, the 

 trapper dives in mid-stream, then half wades, half swims along the 

 steepest bank, running his arm against the clay cliff to find a burrow. 

 On land he could not do this at the lair of the otter ; for the smell 

 of the man-touch would be left on his trail, and the otter, keener 

 of scent and fear than the mink, would take alarm. But for the 

 same reason that the river is the safest refuge for the otter, it is 

 the surest hunting for the man — water does not keep the scent of 

 a trail. So the man runs his arm along the bank. The river is 

 the surest hunting for the man, but not the safest. If an old male 

 were in the bank burrow now, or happened to be emerging from 

 grass-lined subterranean air chambers above the bank gallery, it 

 might be serious enough for the exploring trapper. One bite of 

 nekik the otter has crippled many an Indian. Knowing from the 

 remnants of half-eaten fish and from the holes in the bank that he 

 has found an otter runway, the man goes home as well satisfied 

 as if he had done a good day's work. 



And so that winter when he had camped below the swamp for 

 the mink-hunt, the trapper was not surprised one morning to 

 find a half-eaten fish on the river bank. Sakwasew the mink takes 

 good care to leave no remnants of his greedy meal. What he cannot 

 eat he caches. Even if he has strangled a dozen water-rats in one 

 hunt, they will be dragged in a heap and covered. The half-eaten 

 fish left exposed is not mink's work. Otter has been here and otter 

 will come back ; for as the frost hardens, only those pools below 



