CHAPTER III 
RESULTS OF BEAVERS’ WORK —IN WHAT Way 
MAN DERIVES BENEFIT FROM THE ENGINEER- 
ING FEATS OF THE COUNTLESS GENERATIONS 
OF BEAVERS—METHODS FOR THEIR PROTECTION 
In the foregoing chapters the actual work done 
by the beaver and the immediate object of such 
work as it affects the animals themselves has been 
reviewed. We may now turn to the far-reaching 
results of what is done, and has been done by them 
during the past thousands of years, and the con- 
clusion is forced upon us that the debt we owe to 
the beaver is of such magnitude that it can never 
be repaid. It is very doubtful indeed whether the 
work of any animal has such far-reaching results. 
Other creatures have been of greater value, either 
as furnishing food, or clothing, or means of trans- 
portation, but by themselves, unaided by man, they 
have done no work, they have accomplished little 
or nothing which has been of any direct benefit to 
man except in the way of killing our enemies, in 
which work birds take the highest place, for without 
their perpetual aid we should be overrun by insect 
pests, and be unable to grow our food crops. 
Slowly we are beginning to realise this and are 
