THE BEAVER. 
157 
second toe of the hinder feet is remarkable for being 
formed of two portions, an upper one corresponding 
with those of the remaining toes, and an under placed 
obliquely and having a sharp cutting edge directed 
downwards. 
The gait of the Beavers is waddling and ungraceful, 
owing partly to the shortness and inequality of their 
limbs, and partly to the outward direction which is 
given to their heels to enable their feet more efficiently 
to fulfil the office of paddles in swimming. The toes 
alone of the anterior feet, but the whole of the under 
surface of the sole in the posterior, are applied to the 
ground in walking. The awkwardness of their appear- 
ance in this action is moreover heightened by the 
clumsiness of their figure, and by the difficulty which 
they seem to experience in dragging after them their 
cumbrous tail, which is generally suffered to trail upon 
the ground, but is sometimes slightly elevated or even 
curved upwards, and is occasionally moved in a direc- 
tion from side to side. In the water, however, this 
member becomes most useful, both as a paddle and a 
rudder, to urge them onwards and to direct them in 
their course. 
It has often been questioned whether the Beavers of 
Europe and America constitute two distinct species. 
M. F. Cuvier has lately pointed out some slight vari- 
ations in the form and relative dimensions of different 
portions of the skulls which he had an opportunity of 
examining ; but his observations cannot yet be regarded 
as conclusive. Other naturalists again have broadly 
maintained that the solitary and burrowing mode of life 
of the one, and the social and constructive propensities 
supposed to be peculiar to the other, alone afforded 
sufficient grounds of discrimination between them. But 
numberless instances have shown that these differences 
