THE BEAVER 187 



bites, they have little chance to survive among fierce and powerful 

 carnivores like Lynxes, Bears, and especially Gluttons, unless they have 

 deep water available to retire to. Thus it is that they are led to 

 construct their wonderful dams and other works, when living away 

 from deep water ; they make, in fact, arrangements to insure constant 

 water-accommodation. The dams they construct across streams cause 

 the formation of ponds deep enough to insure the entrances of their 

 burrows and houses being under water, and hence are of the most 

 vital importance. They are constructed in the form of banks, with 

 a foundation of brushwood, intermixed with mud, and poles ; so much 

 of the earth is sometimes used as to in time conceal the timber 

 portion, but this is not usually the case. The woodwork is interlaced, 

 but there is no planting of stakes such as the old accounts represent, 

 and the whole construction has a very rough appearance. In dams 

 mostly made of sticks, the surplus water naturally percolates through, 

 but in an earth-bank dam openings are made at the top to allow for 

 its discharge. 



In addition to the dams, Beavers make canals leading from their 

 ponds into the woods where they cut their wood, and if the banks 

 are steep, they cut " slides " or runways in them. The celebrated 

 " lodges " or houses are piles of sticks, mixed with mud, on the banks, 

 with a small chamber inside, containing beds of leaves and chips, and 

 having two neatly finished entrances opening under water. They are 

 careful to plaster their houses with fresh mud as late in the autumn 

 as possible, so that this mud, freezing, makes the whole structure as 

 hard as stone, and impervious to their great enemy, the Glutton. Besides 

 the houses, they have burrows, which they use as a last refuge in case 

 of urgent danger. 



In summer Beavers lead an easy life, wandering about and feeding 

 on herbage, berries, &c., as well as bark, but towards autumn they work 

 hard at getting in their winter supply of wood. They gnaw through 

 trees a foot in diameter, cut up the boughs into suitable-sized pieces, 

 and sink these in piles in their ponds. Thus, when everything is 

 frozen in winter, they can live at ease on their stores, eked out with 



