CLASS I. MAMMALIA: ORDER 1. RODENTIA. 
433 
THE MUSK-RAT. 
where more or less an object of pursuit. It is endowed with a strong musky smell, but not 
very offensive; the flesh is tolerable food. It lives along the banks of ponds and rivers, some- 
what in the manner of the beaver, building its winter-houses of mud in a conical form, with an 
entrance under water and a drj chamber above. It is a good swimmer though its feet are not 
webbed. In summer it digs burrows along the banks of lakes and streams, forming branched 
canals many yards in extent, and making a nest at the extremity, where the young are produced 
—three litters in a season, and three to five at a time. It may be observed that their modes of 
building, burrowing, and living, vary considerably in different localities — a fact no doubt owing 
to the varying necessities of their situation. Their food consists of grasses, roots of various kinds, 
tender shoots of the bulrush, and reed-mace, acorns, spice-wood, and sometimes, when dwelling 
near human cultivation, turnips, parsnips, and carrots ; they also occasionally eat mussels. In 
winter, when hard pressed, they sometimes devour each other ; when one is wounded the rest set 
to and eat him. 
This is doubtless a dark streak in their character : for the rest, they are mostly a gentle folk, 
pursuing their avocations by nigbt, in a manner so quiet that they seldom intrude on the notice 
of mankind. They are of a sportive humor, and in the mild season, when the lakes and ponds 
are open, they may be seen — especially if moonlight favors the observation — disporting on the 
surface of the waters, swimming, diving, and circling, with all the frolicsome humor of children. 
While some thus give themselves up to merriinent, others are occupied in the graver but not less 
agreeable task of finding their food along the banks. It is said that one of them, at such a time, 
seated on a bank, looks exceedingly like a ball of earth. It is noticed, too, that in diving, they 
make a smart stroke of the tail in the water, which seems to be an imitation of one of the tricks 
of the beaver. They do little damage to man, except in a few cases, when they dig up the borders 
of streams and ditches, jet on account of their fur they are objects of ceaseless persecution. A 
multitude of devices are brought into requisition for their capture : tbey arc sometimes caugbt in 
traps and sometimes shot with guns ; they are dug out and seized by dogs ; the Indians spear 
them in their beds. They are foiind throug-hout the Atlantic States in more or less abundance, 
and are distributed northward through the British territories to the latitude 69° north. In tbe 
far Northwestern regions large numbers are taken by the Indians, who make the hunting of them 
a part of the business of their lives. Several hundred thousand skins are annually obtained. 
YoL. I. — 55 
