32 BEAVERS—THEIR WAYS. 
Fort Stevenson was turned over to the Interior Depart- 
ment at Washington for an Indian school. The school 
was abandoned in the year 1895, and from the begin- 
ning to the end of the school occupation the beavers 
enjoyed protection of the Indian children and made 
some substantial dam breasts near the mouth of the 
stream—the largest of them backing the water for a 
full mile. 
The second colony was located about twelve miles 
up stream from the first named. They lived on what 
s known as the Middle Douglass. The valley there-— 
about is well protected by high ridges, and although 
without timber save a few sparse groves of choke-cherry 
in protected ravines, several fine springs gushed out 
here and there along this part of the creek. With no 
timber to draw on for their provender, these animals 
had substituted their natural feed for that of the com- 
mon muskrat, and were known as were others of that 
class as ‘‘grass’’ beaver. These animals were never as 
large and sleek looking as the ‘‘bark’’ beaver, a fact 
naturally attributed to the inferiority of grass and roots 
as a diet for beavers. 
This colony of grass beaver being located in what 
was known as a ‘‘dangerous neighborhood”’ during the 
Indian wars about old Fort Berthold, they enjoyed an 
immune for many ‘years from human persecution.— 
Even the Red River Half Breeds—ventursome as they | 
usually were—gave a wide birth to the Douglass River | 
tributaries in those days. 
While building many large houses much after the 
manner of muskrats, the greater part of them imita- 
ting the ancestors of the human race became cave dwel- | 
