poplar,--the bark of which only,
however, they eat. These they sink with mud or stones in some quiet
pool near their lodge, and when required for food they dive down below
the ice and bring up as many as are required for family consumption.
Besides their lodge, they form in the neighbourhood a long burrow
sufficiently broad to enable them to turn with ease. The entrance is at
a considerable depth below the surface of the water, and extends from
ten to twenty feet into the bank. This burrow serves as a safe retreat,
should their house be broken into, and thither they immediately fly when
their permanent abode is attacked. In summer they regale themselves on
the roots of the yellow lilies, as well as on other succulent
vegetation, and any fruits the country affords.

But it is time that we should get a look at the curious animal itself.
We may paddle gently in a birch-bark canoe over a calm lake, and conceal
ourselves among the tall grass in some quiet cove where the yellow
water-lilies float on the tranquil surface. Through the still air of
evening, the sound of the distant waterfall reaches our ears. Wood
ducks fly by in vast numbers; the rich glow of the evening sky, still
suffused with the gorgeous hues of the setting sun, is reflected on the
mirror-like expanse of water. Watching with eager eyes, we see at
length the water breaking some forty yards away, and the head and back
of an animal appears in sight. Now another, and then a third, come into
view. After cautiously glancing around, the creatures dive, with a roll
like that of a porpoise, but shortly appear again. Our Indian, pushing
the light canoe from amid the grass, paddles forward with eager strokes.
One of our party fires, and misses, the echoes resounding from the
wood-covered shores, and from island to island, till lost in the
distance; but the cautious animals, forewarned, take good care not to
appear again during that evening. We find that our only prospect of
examining them is by trapping one in the usual Indian fashion, which we
will by-and-by describe.

Mr Beaver, as the Indians are fond of calling the animal, has a body
about three feet long, exclusive of the tail, which is a foot more. He
wears on his back a coat of long shining hair, generally of a light
chestnut colour, but sometimes of a much darker hue, occasionally
perfectly black. Below the hair, next the skin, is a fine, soft,
greyish-brown wool. He may be known at once by his