BEAVER. 



BEAVER. 



418 



" The beaver-houses are built of the same materials as their dams, 

 and are always proportioned in size to the number of inhabitauts, 

 which seldom exceeds four old and six or eight young ones ; though by 

 chance I have seen above double the number. Instead of order or 

 regulation being observed in rearing their houses, they are of a much 

 ruder structure than their dams ; for, notwithstanding the sagacity of 

 these animals, it has never been observed that they aim at any other 

 convenience in their houses than to have a dry place to lie on ; and 

 there they usually eat their victuals, which they occasionally take out 

 of the water. It frequently happens that some of the large houses 

 are found to have one or more partitions, if they deserve that appel- 

 lation, but it is no more than a part of the main building left by the 

 sagacity of the beaver to support the roof. On such occasions it is 

 common for those different apartments, as some are pleased to call 

 them, to have no communication with each other but by water ; so 

 that in fact, they may be called double or treble houses, rather than 

 different apartments of the same house. I have seen a large beaver- 

 house built in a small island that had near a dozen apartments under 

 one roof ; and, two or three of these only excepted, none of them had 

 any communication with each other but by water. As there were 

 beavers enough to inhabit each apartment, it is more than probable 

 that each family knew their own, and always entered at their own 

 doors, without any further connection with their neighbours than a 

 friendly intercourse, and to join their united labours in erecting their 

 separate habitations, and building their dams where required. 

 Travellers who assert that the beavers have two doors to their houses, 

 one on the land side and the other next the water, seem to be leas 

 acquainted with these animals than others who assign them an elegant 

 suite of apartments. Such a construction would render their houses 

 of no use, either to protect them from their enemies, or guard them 

 against the extreme cold of winter. 



" So far are the beavers from driving stakes into the ground when 

 building their houses, that they lay most of the wood crosswise, and 

 nearly horizontal, and without any other order than that of leaving 

 a hollow or cavity in the middle. When any unnecessary branches 

 project inward they cut them off with their teeth, and throw them in 

 among the rest, to prevent the mud from falling through the roof. 

 It is a mistaken notion that the wood-work is first completed and then 

 plastered ; for the whole of their houses, as well as their dams, are, 

 from the foundation, one mass of mud and wood mixed with stones, 

 if they can be procured. The mud is always taken from the edge of 

 the bank, or the bottom of the creek or pond near the door of the 

 house ; and though their fore paws are so small, yet it is held close up 

 between them under their throat : thus they carry both mud and 

 stones, while they always drag the wood with their teeth. All their 

 work is executed in the night, and they are so expeditious that in the 

 course of one night I have known them to have collected as much as 

 amounted to some thousands of their little handsful. It is a great 

 piece of policy in these animals to cover the outside of their houses 

 every fall with fresh mud, and as late as possible in the autumn, even 

 when the frost becomes pretty severe, as by this means it soon freezes 

 as hard as a stone, and prevents their common enemy, the wolverene, 

 from disturbing them during the winter ; and as they are frequently 

 seen to walk over their work, and sometimes to give a flap with their 

 tail, particularly when plunging into the water, this has without 

 doubt given rise to the vulgar opinion that they use their tails as a 

 trowel, with which they plaster their houses ; whereas that flapping of 

 the tail is no more than a custom which they always preserve, even 

 when they become tame and domestic, and more particularly so when 

 they are startled. 



" Their food consists of a large root, something resembling a cabbage- 

 stalk, which grows at the bottom of the lakes and rivers. [Nuphar 

 lutea, according to Sir J. Richardson, the common yellow water-lily.] 

 They also eat the bark of trees, particularly those of the poplar, 

 birch, and willow ; but the ice preventing them from getting to the 

 land in the winter, they have not any barks to feed on in that season, 

 except that of such sticks as they cut down in summer, and throw 

 into the water opposite the doors of their houses ; and as they 

 generally eat a great deal, the roots above mentioned constitute a 

 principal part of their food during the winter. In summer they vary 

 their diet by eating various kinds of herbage, and such berries as 

 grow near their haunts during that season. When the ice breaks up 

 in the spring the beavers always leave their houses, and rove about 

 until a little before the fall of the leaf, when they return again to 

 their old habitations, and lay in their winter-stock of wood. They 

 seldom begin to repair their houses till the frost commences, and never 

 finish the outer coat till the cold is pretty severe, as hath been already 

 mentioned. When they erect a new habitation they begin felling the 

 wood early in the summer, but seldom begin to build until the middle 

 or latter end of August, and never complete it till the cold weather 

 be set in. 



" Persons who attempt to take beaver in winter should be thoroughly 

 acquainted with their manner of life, otherwise they will have endless 

 trouble to effect their purpose, because they have always a number of 

 holes in the banks, which serve them as places of retreat when any 

 injury is offered to their houses, and in general it is in those holen that 

 they are taken. When the beavers which are situated in a small 

 river or creek are to be taken, the Indians sometimes find it necessary 

 HAT. HUT. D1V. VOL. I. 



to stake the river across, to prevent them from passing ; after which 

 they endeavour to find out all their holes or places of retreat in the 

 banks. This requires much practice and experience to accomplish, and 

 is performed in the following manner : Every man being furnished 

 with an ice-chisel, lashes it to the end of a small staff about four or 

 five feet long ; he then walks along the edge of the banks, and keeps 

 knocking his chisel against the ice. Those who are acquainted with 

 that kind of work well know by the sound of the ice when they are 

 opposite to any of the beavers' holes or vaults. As soon as they 

 suspect any, they cut a hole through the ies big enought to admit an 

 old beaver, and in this manner proceed till they have found out all 

 their places of retreat, or at least as many of them as possible. While 

 the principal men are thus employed, some of the understrappers and 

 the women are busy in breaking open the house, which at times is no 

 eaay task, for I have frequently known these houses to be 5 or 6 feet 

 thick, and one in particular was more than 8 feet thick in the crown. 

 When the beavers find that their habitations are invaded, they fly to their 

 holes in the banks for shelter ; and on being perceived by the Indians, 

 which is easily done by attending to the motion of the water, they 

 block up the entrance with stakes of wood, and then haul the beaver 

 out of its hole, either by hand, if they can reach it, or with a large 

 hook made for that purpose, which is fastened to the end of a long 

 stick. In this kind of hunting, .every man has the sole right to all 

 the beavers caught by him in the holes or vaults ; and as this is a 

 constant rule, each person takes care to mark such as he discovers by 

 sticking up a branch of a tree, by which he may know them. All that 

 are caught in the house are the property of the person who finds it. 

 The beaver is an animal which cannot keep under water long at a 

 time, so that when their houses are broken open, and all their places of 

 retreat discovered, they have but one choice left, as it may be called, 

 either to be taken in their house or their vaults ; in general they prefer 

 the latter, for where there is one beaver caught in the house, many 

 thousands are taken in the vaults in the banks. Sometimes they are 

 caught in nets, and in summer very frequently in traps. 



" lu respect to the beavers dunging in their houses, as some persons 

 assert, it is quite wrong, as they always plunge into water to do it. 

 I am the better enabled to make this assertion from having kept 

 several of them till they became so domesticated as to answer to their 

 name, and follow those to whom they were accustomed in the same 

 manner as a dog would do, and they were as much pleased at being 

 fondled as any animal I ever saw. In cold weather they were kept in 

 my own sitting-room, where they were the constant companions of the 

 Indian women and children, and were so fond of their company that 

 when the Indians were absent for any considerable time, the beaver 

 discovered great signs of uneasiness, and on their return showed equal 

 marks of pleasure by fondling on them, crawling into their laps, lying 

 on their backs, sitting erect like a squirrel, and behaving like children 

 who see their parents but seldom. In general during the winter they 

 lived on the same food as the women did, and were remarkably fond 

 of rice and plum-pudding ; they would eat patridges and fresh venison 

 very freely, but I never tried them with fish, though I have heard they 

 will at times prey on them. In fact there are few graminivorous 

 animals that may not be brought to be carnivorous." 



Mr. Broderip, in his 'Note-Book of a Naturalist,' p. 1, gives au 

 interesting account of the manners and habits of a pet Beaver during 

 its captivity. It manifested the same instincts, though exercised 

 upon very different materials, as those described so graphically in the 

 above passage from Hearne. 



Little need be said of the value of the fur of the Beaver in commerce, 

 a value greatly heightened by the proclamation of Charles I. in 1638, 

 expressly prohibiting the use of any materials except beaver-stuff or 

 beaver-wool in the manufacture of hats, and forbidding the making of 

 the hats called 'demi-costors,' unless for exportation. This proclamation 

 was an almost exterminating death-warrant to the poor beavers. They 

 were speedily swept away from the more southern colonies, and the 

 traffic became for the most part confined to Canada and Hudson's Bay. 

 The havoc made amongst them, even at that period, may be imagined 

 by an inspection of the imports of 1743. In that year the Hudson's 

 Bay Company offered for sale 26,750 beaver-skins, and in the same 

 year 127,080 were imported into Rochelle. These, it will be remem- 

 bered, are only the legal returns, making no allowance for smuggling. 

 In 1788 upwards of 170,000 were exported from Canada, and in 1808 

 126,927 were sent from Quebec alone to this country. The value of 

 these last has been estimated at 118.994J. Is. 3rf. sterling, at an average 

 of 18s. 9rf. for each skin. These numbers, as might be expected, 

 could not be kept up without almost total extermination ; and we 

 find, accordingly, that in 1827 the importation into London from a 

 fur country of more than four times the extent of that which was 

 occupied in 1743 was but little beyond 50^00. At the present time 

 (1853) about 60,000 beaver-skins are annually imported into this 

 country, of which 12,000 are again exported. Many other materials 

 are now employed for making hats. 



The Beaver, although some have considered it another species, is 

 an inhabitant of Europe. The earliest notice of the European Beaver 

 (xdartap) is in Herodotus (book iv. c. 109), who describes it as inhabit- 

 ing a large lake in the country of the Budini, a nation whom he places 

 on the east side of the Upper Don (iv. 21). He says that the skin was 

 used for clothing. Aristotle (book viii. c. 5) mentions the European 



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