3n 



the outskirts of it. He occasionally dams a stream, 

 digs a canal, leads water to a dry place, and there 

 forms and fills a reservoir and establishes a home. 

 Often his house is built by a spring and thus the 

 danger from thick ice avoided. These are some 

 of the reasons for my believing him to be intel- 

 ligent. 



Morgan speaks of the beaver as " endowed with 

 a mental principle which performs for him the 

 same office that the human mind does for man," 

 and says, " The works of the beaver afford many 

 interesting illustrations of his intelligence and rea- 

 soning capacity," also, " In the capacity thereby 

 displayed of adapting their works to the ever-vary- 

 ing circumstances in which they find themselves 

 placed instead of following blindly an invariable 

 type, some evidence of possession on their part 

 Qifree intelligence is undoubtedly furnished." 



Mr. George J. Romanes has the following 

 opinion of the beaver: " Most remarkable among 

 rodents for instinct and intelligence, unques- 

 tionably stands the beaver. Indeed there is no 

 animal not even excepting the ants and bees 

 where instinct has risen to a higher level of far- 

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