124 
PORIST AJSTf) StREAM. 
and good workers. On the Nechi and around Zaragoza 
and Remedies they are nearly all miners. 
The hext day we traveled better, as the Abater had 
fallen some 2 feet. We saw but two or three caimanes 
and not more people except the family at a house near 
which we stopped for lunch at noon. At 7 o'clock in 
the evening we reached Matanzas, where a trail leaves the 
river for a mine forty-five miles back through the forest. 
There is a house for shelter of men or goods, and a 
pasture field for pack animals. In Colombia everj' lo- 
cality is given a name, whether there be anything there 
or not, a method which has the merit of avoiding long 
descriptions when arranging a meeting point or stating 
a destination. When I left Matanzas six weeks later, I 
had a larger canoe, witli a crew of three and two other 
passengers, Harry Dunstan and a storekeeper from 
Liana, a hamlet four miles from the river by the trail. 
After two hours' travel, one of the men broke a prong 
oft' his push pole, so we stopped while he went ashore to 
cut a hardwood crotch with which to mend it. A gang 
of red monkeys was making a great row not far of?, and 
from where I sat I caught an occasional glimpse of one 
moving in the treetops a hundred yards back. Pres- 
ently I saw one clearly squatting on a limb away up in 
an enormous tree, so far off that it looked like a little 
chipmunk. I put up my Winchester, but found when I 
sighted that a slender horizontal branch of a sapling on 
the bank completely shut out the monkey. I explained 
this to my companion by word and pantomime, then 
sighted again, when just as I said, "Now, as I sight, 
that little branch completely covers," my finger touched 
the trigger and the branch fell. I threw in another car- 
tridge, fired again, and down came the monkey. The 
crotch and the monkey both in the boat, everybody had 
. to smoke while we awaited the mending of the push 
pole. Gathering from chance words and gestures of the 
crew that the death of the monkey was bein.g discussed, 
I asked what they were talking about, "Oh," said Dun- 
stan. "they are saying, 'Wonderful! wonderful! The 
general says there is a limb, I cannot see the monkey. 
He fires and cuts away the limb. He fires again, the 
monkey is dead. Santa Maria, what shooting!' Your 
having but one arm makes it more extraordinary to 
them. I doubt whether one of them could hit it at 20 
yards." The monkey measured, body, 21 inches; tail, 
23 inches, standing, 30 inches. We saw no caimanes until 
afternoon. Just after lunch I killed one 16 feet long, a 
difficult shot at 150 yards, and toward the sun. I missed 
another huge one by underestimating the distance 
and the motion of the canoe. An American trader in 
caiman skins who buys them from the natives ana ships 
them to the States said recently, in answer to a question, 
that the largest skin he had shipped was 21 feet long by 
5^2 feet wide. This of course was the belly skin only; 
that of the back would be one-fifth wider, so that the 
creature was 22 feet long and 12 feet around the body. 
Several miles below Zaragoza the river cuts through 
,.a range of hills, where for several miles the stream is 
narrow, deep and swift. The densely wooded hills come 
to the water's edge, sometimes with clif?s and every- 
where rocky. We went through these narrows by moon- 
light, a delightful experience. Just above, the river is 
spread out over constantly shifting sandbars and is very 
^shiallow. We made a number of attempts before we suc- 
ceeded in rounding a rocky point, where we emerged 
•'■from the narrows and struck the converging currents. 
' About 9 o'clock we reached Zaragoza, our journey's end. 
When the insurrection began in Colombia the Govern- 
ment seized all the steamboats on the river, so that for 
.two years there has been no internal commerce. Only 
'"a few dozen people are left in Zaragoza, and a good part 
.of the place was hurried as being a nest of the Liberals. 
The country round about and up and down the Nechi is 
denuded of men who are in one army or the other or 
.hiding in the woods to avoid service. Supplies are ex- 
•'.hansted, no crops are being raised, and that section of 
'country is in bad condition. All the mines, English, 
French and American, are idle. Officials of some of 
them have been in Barranquilla more .than a year, unable 
to get permission to go to them, either by Government 
boat or canoe. In whatever way the civil war may end, 
it will take the country a good while to recover from its 
effects. Cecil Clay. 
WHd Animals of the North. 
•^'rom .Richardson's "Fauna Boreali- Americana; or the Zoology of 
. • the Northern Parts of British America." 
The Beaver. 
No animal has been the subject of moje essays and of 
more imaginative writing than the beaver; and Rich- 
ardson, who, of course, passed through the region of 
the beaver's greatest abundance in North America, has 
much to say about it, and quotes, plentifully from 
Hearne, for reasons given in his own Avords: 
"The beaver attains its fuU size in about three years; 
but breeds before that time. According to Indian re- 
ppr^^ it pairs in February, and after carrying its young 
about ten weeks brings forth from four to eight or 
nine tubs, toward the middle or end of May. Hearne 
states the usual number of young produced by the beaver 
• at a time to be from two to five, and that he saw six 
iOnly in two instances, although he had witnessed the 
capture of some hundreds in a gravid state. The fe- 
male has eight teats. In the pairing season the call 
of the beaver is a kind of groan; but the voice of the 
cubs, which are very playful, resembles the cry of an 
infant. When the beaver cuts down a tree it gnaws if 
all round, cutting it, however^ somewhat higher on the 
btie side than the other, by which the direction of its 
(all is determined. The stump is conical, and of such 
a height as a beaver, sitting on his hind quarters, could 
make. The largest tree I observed cut down by them 
was about the thickness of a man's thigh (that is, six 
or seven inches in diameter) ; but Mr. Graham says 
that he has seen them cut a tree which was ten inches 
in diameter. 
"Pennant fixes the southern range of the American 
beaver in latitude 30 degrees, in Louisiana, not far 
'fi^om the Gulf of Mexico; while Say mentions the con- 
fluence' of the Ohio and Mississippi as. their limit, which 
is about seven degrees further to the northward.. In 
high latitudes they are confined to the WO bde^ ' dis- 
tricts, there not being even willows enough for their 
subsistence on the banks of the small lakes and rivulets 
of the Barren Grounds. Their most northern range is, 
perhaps, on the banks of the Mackenzie, which is the 
largest American river that discharges itself into the 
Polar Sea, and is also the best wooded, owing' to the 
quantity of alluvial soil deposited on its banks. Beavers 
occur in that quarter as high as 67^4 degrees or 68 de- 
grees of latitude, and their range from east to west ex- 
tends from one side of the continent to the other, with 
the exception of the Barren districts. They are pretty 
numerous in the country lying immediately to the north- 
ward of Fort Franklin; and from the swampy and im- 
practicable nature of the country, they are not likely 
to be soon eradicated from thence. The Iroquois are 
the greatest beaver takers in Canada, and their hunters 
now allot the beaver districts among themselves and 
endeavor to preserve these animals from extinction by 
trenching the beaver dams of any one quarter only once 
in four or five years, and taking care to leave always a 
pair at least in a dam to breed. Further north the In- 
dians, when they break up a beaver lodge, destroy, as 
far as they are able, both young and old, and the num- 
bers of beaver are consequently now very much reduced. 
Gangs of Iroquois were also introduced into the fur 
countries to the north some years ago; and by setting 
traps, which destroyed indiscriminately beaver of all 
sizes, they almost extirpated the species from their hunt- 
ing grounds. The Hudson's Bay Co. are, however, en- 
deavoring to remedy this evil, by laying plans to insure 
an adequate supply of the very useful beaver fur, al- 
though it is not likely that it can ever be so plentiful 
as it was formerly. In the year 1743 the imports of 
beaver skins into the ports of London and Rochelle 
amounted to upward of 150,000; and there is reason to 
suppose that a considerable additional quantity was at 
that period introduced, illicitly, into Great Britain. In 
1827 the importation of beaver skins into London, from 
more than four times the extent of fui- country than 
that which was occupied in 1743, did not much exceed 
50,000. 
"In some seasons a great mortality occurs among the 
beavers from some unknown cause, many being found 
dead in their lodges. Toward the north the fur of the 
beaver is better, and continues in prime order through 
a greater portion of the year. At Great Slave Lake, in 
latitude 61, July, August and September are the only 
months in which the beaver fur of inferior quality is 
procured. In commerce, beaver skins cut open, stretched 
to a hoop and dried in the ordinary manner, are named 
beaver parchment, and form by far the greatest £art 
of the importation. When the beaver skins have been 
made into dresses and worn by the Indians, it is termed 
beaver coat; and, though it may have been in use a 
whole season, it still brings a good price. Inferior-sized 
skins are named beaver-cub. An incisor tooth of a 
beaver is fixed in a wooden handle by the northern In- 
dians and used with great dexterity to cut bone. This 
was the instrument with which the people fashioned the 
horns of the reindeer into spear-heads and fish-gigs; but 
these bone weapons are now generally replaced by iron, 
and the beaver tooth has been supplanted by an Eng- 
lish file. 
■'The best account of the manners of the beaver, and 
the most free of extravagancies, is that given by Hearne; 
and it agrees so exactly with the information I received 
from the Indian hunters that were I to record the latter 
it Avould appear to be borrowed almost entirely from 
that traveler. I therefore prefer giving it in Hearne's 
own words: 
" 'The beaver being so plentiful, the attention of my 
companions was chiefly engaged on them, as they not 
only furnished delicious food, but their skins proved a 
valuable acquisition, being a principal article of trade, 
as well as a serviceable one for clothing. The situation 
of the beaver-houses is various. Where the beavers 
are numerous they are found to inhabit lakes, ponds and 
rivers, as well as those narrow creeks which connect 
the numerous lakes with which this country abounds; 
but the two latter are generally chosen by them when 
the depth of water and other circumstances are suitable, 
as they have then the advantage of a current to convey 
wood and other necessaries to their habitations, and 
because in general they are more difficult to be taken 
than those that are built in standing water. They al- 
ways choose those parts that have such a depth of water 
as will resist the frost in winter and prevent it from 
freezing at the bottom. The beavers that build their 
houses in small rivers or creeks in which water is liable 
to be drained off when the back supplies are dried up 
by the frost, are wonderfully taught by instinct to pro- 
vide against that evil, by making a dam quite across the 
river at a convenient distance from their houses. The 
beaver dams differ in shape according to the nature of 
the place in which they are built. If the water in the 
river or creek have but little motion, the dam is al- 
most straight; but when the current is more rapid, it is 
always made with a considerable curve, convex toward 
the stream. The materials made use of are drift-wood, 
green willows, birch and poplars, if they can be got; also 
mud and stones intermixed in such a manner as must 
evidently contribute to the strength of the dam; , but 
there is no other order or method observed in the dams 
except that of the work being carried on with a regu- 
lar sweep, and all the parts' being made of equal 
strength. In places which have been long frequented 
by beavers undisturbed, their dams, by frequent repair- 
ing, become a solid bank, capable of resisting a great 
force, both of water and ice; and as the willow, poplar 
and birch generally take root and shoot up, they by de- 
grees form a kind of regular planted hedge, which I 
have seen in some places so tall that birds have built 
their nests. among the branches. 
" 'The beaver houses are built of the same materials 
as their damS, and are always proportioned in size to 
the number of inhabitants, which seldom exceeds four 
old and six or eight j^oung ones; though, by chance, I 
have seen above double that number. Instead of order 
or regulation being observed in rearing their houses, 
they are of much ruder structure than their dams; for^ 
notwithstanding the sagacity of these animals, it has 
never, been observed that they aim at any other con- 
venience in their houses than to have a dry place to He 
on; and there they usually eat their victuals, which th( 
occasionally take out of the water. It frequentlj' ha; 
pens that some of the large houses are found to hai 
one or more partitions, if they deserve that appellatiol 
but it is no more than a part of the main building, hi 
by the sagacity of the beaver to support the roof. G 
such occasions it is common for those dift'erent apaii 
ments, as some are pleased to call them, to have t 
communication with each other but by water; so tht 
in fact, they may be called double or treble hous« 
rather than different apartments of the same house, 
have seen a large beaver house built in a small islai. 
that had near a dozen apartments under one roof, ai 
two or three of these only excepted, none of them hii 
any communication with each other but by water. / 
there were beavers enough to inhabit each apartmei' 
it is more than probable that each family knew the' 
own and always entered at their own doors, witho 
any further connection with their neighbors than 
friendly intercourse, and to join their united labors 
erecting their separate habita.tions and building the 
dams where required. Travelers who assert that tl, 
beavers have two doors to their houses, one on the lai 
side and the other next the water, seem to be less a; 
quainted with these animals than others who assig 
them an elegant suite of apartments. Such a constrti 
tion would render their houses of no use, either to pr^ 
tect them from their enemies or guard them again 
the extreme cold of winter. 
" 'So far are the beavers from driving stakes into tli 
ground when building their houses, that they lay most 
the wood crosswise, and nearly horizontal, and witho,; 
any other order than that of leaving a hollow or cavi 
in the middle; when any unnecessary branches proje 
inward they cut them oii with their teeth and thro 
them in among the rest to prevent the mud from fallii 
through the roof. It is a mistaken notion that t) 
woodwork is first completed then plastered for tl 
whole of their houses as well as their dams are, fro' 
the foundation, one mass of mud and wood, mixed wi 
stones, if they can be procured. The mud is alwa 
taken from the edge of the bank or the bottom of t' 
creek or pond, near the door of the house, and thouj 
their forepaws are so small, ye-- it is held close up b 
tween them under their throat, that they carry both mi 
and stones, while they, always drag the wood with thi 
teeth. All their work is executed in the night, and th 
are so expeditious that in the course of one night I ha' 
known them to have collected as much mud as amount' 
to some thousands of their little handfuls. It is a gre 
piece of policy in those animals to cover the outsii 
of their houses every fall with fresh mud, and as late 
possible in the autumn, even when the frost becom 
pretty severe, as by this means it soon freezes as ha 
as a stone, and prevents their common enemy, tl 
wolverine, from disturbing them during the winter. Ai 
as they are frequently seen to walk over their work, ai 
sometimes to give a flap with their tail, particularly whi 
plunging into tha water, this has, without doubt, giyi 
rise to the vulgar opinion that they used their tails as 
'trowel with which they plaster their houses, wherea 
that flapping of the tail is no more than a custom whi( 
they always preserve, even when they become tame ai 
domestic, and more particularly so when they aj 
startled. 
Their food consists of a large root, something r 
sembling a cabbage-stalk, which grows at the bottom 
the lakes and rivers. They also eat the bark of ire( 
partitularly those of the poplar, birch and willow: b 
the ice preventing them from getting to the land 
the winter, they have not any barks to feed on in th 
season except that of such sticks as they cut down 
summer and throw into the water . opposite the doc 
of their houses; and as they generally eat a great dei 
the roots above mentioned constitute a principal pa 
of their food during the winter. In summer they vaj 
their diet by eating various kinds of herbage and sni 
berries as grow near their haunts during that seaso 
When the ice breaks up in the spring the beavers alwa; 
leave their houses and rove about until a little befo' 
the fall of the leaf, when they return again to their o 
habitations and lay in their winter stock of wood. Tin 
seldom begin to repair their houses till the frost con 
mences and never finish the outer coat till the cold 
pretty severe, as hath been already mentioned. Whf 
they erect a new habitation they begin felling the woe 
early in summer, but seldom begin to build until tl 
rniddle or latter end of August, and never complete 
till the cold weather be set in. 
[to be continued.] 
Eugene Blackford, the ex-Fish Commissioner, wj; 
standing in the door of his office in Fulton Market ot 
day last week, when a literary woman came up to hii 
and said: "Mr. Blackford, I am gathering material f( 
an article on crabs. Do you think those little crus'J 
ceans have the faculty of reasoning?" 
"Well, madam," replied Mr. Blackford, "I have nev( 
given the subject a thought, but I have known crabs t 
do some remarkable things. Last summer I was fisl 
ing for flounders in Jamaica Bay. The water was shai 
low, and I could easily see the bottom. A crab sidle 
up to my bait, picked up the hook with one claw, too 
oft' the bait with the other, ate it, and then chmbed U 
the hue hand over hand, tumbled into the boat, and wei 
nosing around looking for the bait box. If that isn 
reason, it certainly is a very high de,gree of instinct. 
New York Times. 
A negro named Floyd Goiiyer and his men of Ceds 
Key. Fla., met with a peculiar adventure with a tarpo 
a few nights ago. While sailing along there was a sui; 
den splash in the water and a heavy object fell on th 
deck, which proved to be a tarpon, between five an 
six feet long. After striking the deck it gave ano.ha 
leap and struck the sail, which knocked it back upo 
the deck, and into the hatchway, where they succeede 
in capturing it. The negroes were frightened nearly 01 
of their wits. They thought it was a mermaid or som 
horrible sea serpent, and were almost ready to desert tW 
ship. — ^Jacksonville (Fla.) Times-Union. 
