28 



THE CABINET OF NATURAL HISTORY, 



AUTHENTIC HISTORY— Continued. 



FICTITIOUS HISTORY— Continued. 



is but indifferent eating, and their skins of so little value, 

 that the Indians generally singe them, even to the amount 

 of many thousands in one summer. They have from two 

 to five young, at a time. Mr. Dobbs, in his account of 

 Hudson's Bay, enumerates no less than eight different 

 kinds of beaver; but it must be understood that they are 

 all of one kind and species; his distinctions arise wholly 

 from the different seasons of the year in which they are 

 killed, and the different uses to which their skins are ap- 

 plied, which is the sole reason that they vary so much in 

 value. 



"Joseph Lefranc, or Mr. Dobbs for him, says, that a 

 good hunter can kill six hundred beaver in one season, and 

 can only carry one hundred to market. If that was 

 really the case in Lefranc's time, the canoes must have 

 been much smaller than they are at present; for it is 

 well known that the generality of the canoes which have 

 visited the Company's Factories for the last forty or fifty 

 years, are capable of carrying three hundred beaver-skins 

 with great ease, exclusive of the Indian's luggage, pro- 

 visions, &c. 



"If ever a particular Indian killed six hundred beaver 

 in one winter, (which is rather to be doubted,) it is more 

 than probable that many in his company did not kill 

 twenty, and perhaps some none at all; so that by distri- 

 buting them among those who had bad success, and others 

 who had no abilities for that kind of hunting, there would 

 be no necessity of leaving them to rot, or for singing them 

 in the fire, as related by that author. During my resi- 

 dence among the Indians I have known some individuals 

 kill more beaver, and other heavy furs, in the course of 

 a winter, than their wives could manage; but the overplus 

 was never wantonly destroyed, but always given to their 

 relations, or to those who had been less successful; so that 

 the whole of the great hunter's labours were always brought 

 to the factory. It is indeed too frequently a custom among 

 the southern Indians to singe many otters, as well as 

 beaver; but this is seldom done, except in summer, when 

 their skins are of so little value as to be scarcely worth the 

 duty; on which account it has been always thought im- 

 politic to encourage the natives to kill such valuable ani- 

 . mals at a time when their skins are not in season. 



"The white beaver, mentioned by Lefranc, are so rare, 

 that instead of being ' blown upon tfy the Company's 

 Factors,' as he asserts, I rather doubt whether one-tenth of 

 them ever saw one during the time of their residence in 

 this country. In the course of twenty years experience 

 in the countries about Hudson's Bay, though I tra- 

 velled six hundred miles to the west of the sea-coast, 



customary rights of war, expel the conquered from their 

 home, take possession of it themselves, appoint a provi- 

 sional garrison for the occupation, and eventually estab- 

 lish in it a colony of young Beavers. In this connexion, 

 another circumstance relating to these truly wonderful 

 creatures will appear not less astonishing. 



" The female Beaver whelps usually in the month of 

 April, and produces as many as four young ones. She 

 sustains, and carefully instructs them for a year, that is, 

 till the family are on the eve of a new increase; and then 

 these young Beavers, compelled thus to make room for 

 others, build a new home by the side of the paternal man- 

 sion, if they be not very numerous; but if there should be 

 too many to admit of this, they are obliged to go, with 

 others, to a new spot, forming a new tribe and a new estab- 

 lishment. If, then, about this season the enemy should 

 happen to be driven from his quarters, the conquerors 

 install in them their own young ones of the current year, 

 provided they be duly qualified for emancipation; or, in 

 other words, capable of managing for themselves. 



" The Indians have related to me as a positive fact, ano- 

 ther circumstance respecting the conduct of these ani- 

 mals; but it is so extraordinary, that I leave you to credit 

 it or not, as you may think proper. 



"They allege, and some will even assert themselves to 

 have been eye-witnesses of such a fact, that the two chiefs 

 of hostile tribes sometimes terminate the quarrel by a single 

 combat, in presence of the two opposing armies, instances 

 of which have occurred in various nations; or by a con- 

 flict of three with three, like the Horatii and Curatii of 

 antiquity. 



" Beavers practise the usage of matrimony, and death 

 alone separates the parties. They inflict heavy punish- 

 ments on their females for infidelity, and sometimes even 

 death itself. 



"In cases of sickness, they mutually and anxiously 

 take care of each other; and the sick express their pain by 

 plaintive sounds and tones like the human race. 



" The Indians hunt the Beaver in the same way in 

 which I formerly described them to you as hunting the 

 musk-rat: indeed the latter animal may be considered as a 

 Beaver of a secondary order. It is of the same shape, only 

 smaller, and resembles it in many of its qualities, but its 

 fur is very inferior in beauty and fineness. It may be 

 added, that in winter the Indians make holes in the ice 

 which covers the ponds surrounding the habitation of the 

 Beavers, and, carefully watching for the moment when 

 they lift up their heads to take breath, instantly shoot 

 them. 



