OF A RANCHMAN 85 



molested for perhaps a dozen years, when 

 the process would be repeated. But the in- 

 coming of the settlers and the driving out 

 of the Indians have left the ground clear for 

 the trappers to work over unintermittently, 

 and the extinction of the beaver throughout 

 the plains country is a question of but a short 

 time. Excepting an occasional otter or 

 mink, or a few musk-rats, it is the only fur- 

 bearing animal followed by the western 

 plains trapper; and its large size and the 

 marked peculiarities of its habits, together 

 with the accessibility of its haunts on the 

 plains, as compared with its haunts in the 

 deep woods and mountains, render its pur- 

 suit and capture comparatively easy. We 

 have trapped (or occasionally shot) on the 

 ranch during the past three years several 

 score beaver ; the fur is paler and less valua- 

 ble than in the forest animal. Those that 

 live in the river do not build dams all across 

 it, but merely extending up some distance 

 against the current, so as to make a deep 

 pool or eddy, beside which are the burrows 



