FIBER ZIBETHICUS. 
189 
in the water. Fortunately, the fish was attached to a hook and line, 
and the Muskrat was caught and killed. 
The above facts, which were published in Forest and Stream of 
March 27th and April 3d, 1884, fell under the eye of Mr. E W. 
Nelson, late Signal Observer at St. Michaels, Alaska, and elicited 
from him the following additional testimony : “ The Muskrat is the 
most abundant mammal to be found in all the marshy parts of Alaska, 
south of the Arctic circle at least, and during my residence in that 
country I had frequent opportunity to learn of its fondness for fish. 
Often when skirting the border of a pool or following the edge of 
some sluggish stream in the evening or during the dim light of the 
Arctic nights in summer, I frightened the Muskrats from the body of 
dead fish on the bank at the water’s edge. The fish were usually 
small sluggish species and such as could have been easily caught by 
the animal itself, although it feeds upon fish not killed by itself. 
That the Muskrat will feed upon dead water fowl I have also had 
frequent occasion to notice.” * 
Mr. Charles F. Carr writes me that in Wolf River, Wisconsin, 
twelve or fifteen years ago, Muskrats were in the habit of eating fish 
from a gill net set there by a man named Rich. 
Ferocious Tendencies of the Muskrat. 
Under the above heading Mr. W. H. Ballou, in the American 
Naturalist for July, 1880, narrates the following very unusual expe- 
rience : “ I was sauntering along a prairie road just out of Boone, 
Iowa, one night during the past winter. There was no snow on the 
ground and the moon was just glimmering through the clouds. Of 
a sudden I was startled by the appearance of some animal from the 
long grass by the wayside, which dashed up my leg. I knocked 
it off, picked up a frozen piece of mud and broke its leg. Again it 
made a rush for me, and another piece of mud sent it rolling over. 
* Forest and Stream, Vol. XXII, No. 15, May 8, 1884, p. 285. 
