MAMMALIA. ° 111 
that in the course of one night I have known them to have collected as much 
mud as amounted to some thousands of their little handfuls. It is a great piece 
of policy in those animals to cover the outside of their houses every fall with fresh 
mud, and as late as possible in the autumn, even when the frost becomes pretty 
severe, as by this means it soon freezes as hard as a stone, and prevents their 
common enemy, the wolverene, from disturbing them during the winter. And as 
they are frequently seen to walk over their work, and sometimes to give a flap 
with their tail, particularly when plunging into the water, this has, without doubt, 
given rise to the vulgar opinion that they used their tails as a trowel, with which 
they plaster their houses; whereas that flapping of the tail is no more than a 
custom which they always preserve, even when they become tame and domestic, 
and more particularly so when they are startled. 
“ Their food consists of a large root*, something resembling a cabbage-stalk, 
which grows at the bottom of the lakes and rivers. They also eat the bark of 
trees, particularly those of the poplar, birch, and willow; but the ice preventing 
them from getting to the land in the winter, they have not any barks to feed on 
in that season, except that of such sticks as they cut down in summer, and throw 
into the water opposite the doors of their houses; and as they generally eat a 
great deal, the roots above-mentioned constitute a principal part of their food 
during the winter. In summer, they vary their diet, by eating various kinds 
of herbage, and such berries as grow near their haunts during that season. 
When the ice breaks up in the spring, the beavers always leave their houses, 
and rove about until a little before the fall of the leaf, when they return again to 
their old habitations, and lay in their winter-stock of wood. They seldom 
begin to repair the houses till the frost commences, and never finish the outer 
coat till the cold is pretty severe, as hath been already mentioned. When they 
erect a new habitation, they begin felling the wood early in summer, but seldom 
begin to build until the middle or latter end of August, and never complete it till 
the cold weather be set in. . 
** Persons who attempt to take beaver in winter should be thoroughly 
acquainted with their manner of life, otherwise they will have endless trouble to 
effect their purpose, because they have always a number of holes in the banks, 
which serve them as places of retreat when any injury is offered to their houses ; 
and in general it is in those holes that they are taken. When the beaver which 
are situated in a small river or creek are to be taken, the Indians sometimes find 
he oa 
* Root of Nuphar luteum.—J. R. 
