pper in all that relates to his pursuit, that he
can detect the slightest sign of beaver, however wild; and although the
lodge may be concealed by close thickets and overhanging willows, he can
generally, at a single glance, make an accurate guess at the number of
its inmates. He now goes to work to set his trap; planting it upon the
shore, in some chosen place, two or three inches below the surface of
the water, and secures it by a chain to a pole set deep in the mud. A
small twig is then stripped of its bark, and one end is dipped in the
"medicine," as the trappers term the peculiar bait which they employ.
This end of the stick rises about four inches above the surface of
the water, the other end is planted between the jaws of the trap. The
beaver, possessing an acute sense of smell, is soon attracted by the
odor of the bait. As he raises his nose toward it, his foot is caught
in the trap. In his fright he throws a somerset into the deep water. The
trap, being fastened to the pole, resists all his efforts to drag it
to the shore; the chain by which it is fastened defies his teeth; he
struggles for a time, and at length sinks to the bottom and is drowned.

Upon rocky bottoms, where it is not possible to plant the pole, it is
thrown into the stream. The beaver, when entrapped, often gets fastened
by the chain to sunken logs or floating timber; if he gets to shore, he
is entangled in the thickets of brook willows. In such cases, however,
it costs the trapper diligent search, and sometimes a bout at swimming,
before he finds his game.

Occasionally it happens that several members of a beaver family are
trapped in succession. The survivors then become extremely shy, and
can scarcely be "brought to medicine," to use the trapper's phrase for
"taking the bait." In such case, the trapper gives up the use of the
bait, and conceals his traps in the usual paths and crossing places of
the household. The beaver now being completely "up to trap," approaches
them cautiously, and springs them ingeniously with a stick. At other
times, he turns the traps bottom upwards, by the same means, and
occasionally even drags them to the barrier and conceals them in the
mud. The trapper now gives up the contest of ingenuity, and shouldering
his traps, marches off, admitting that he is not yet "up to beaver."

On the day following Captain Bonneville's supervision of the industrious
and frolicsome community of beavers, of which he has given so edi