animal — using his tail as a substitute for hands. As they fall one after another, he plunges in and guides them to their destination, where they are safely moored for future use.
The beaver possesses great strength in his tail, which is twelve or fifteen inches long, four broad, and a half inch thick. This part of the animal is highly esteemed by trappers, and assimilates a fish in taste, though it is far superior to any of the finny tribe.
His teeth are very sharp, (incisors,) two inches or more in length, perfectly round and of a uniform size, with the exception of the cutting extremities, which are gouge-like, about the eighth of an inch in diameter, and nearly in the shape of a semicircle.
Beaver lodges are commonly constructed in holes carefully excavated in the banks of streams, in such a manner that the entrances are entirely covered by water. It is very rarely they build in any other manner, notwithstanding most writers upon this subject assert the contrary.
The female usually produces two, and sometimes three, at a birth, but seldom rears more than one; — first destroying the least likely, she bestows much attention upon her favorite offspring, and nurses it with great tenderness.
The character and habits of this curious animal, in other respects, have probably met the reader's eye through other sources, so that a more extended notice under this head would be unnecessary.
Having procured a fresh supply of ammunition from Fort Lancaster, some two weeks succeeding our arrival at this place I visited the mountains on a hunting excursion, in company with a single voyageur.
Our course lead up Vasque's creek for fifteen or twenty miles, to a ridge of high table land, through which we passed, by a circuitous route, and were ushered into a broad and beautiful valley, bounded upon the east by the ridge before named, and on the west by a lofty mountain chain.
Vasque's creek is well timbered, and has a rich bottom, averaging one mile in breadth, and is skirted by a slightly undulating prairie, quite productive in various kinds of grasses.
This creek is from eight to ten yards wide, and affords a body of water more than a foot in depth. It heads in the main chain of the mountains, where it claims a valley of considerable extent, enclosed upon all sides by lofty ridges that preclude the possibility of approach, except a two points marking an Indian pass to the waters of Grand river.
From thence it winds its way between long defiles of mountains, that close in abruptly upon its very water's edge, till it finally intersects the valley first spoken of, and forces itself through the high ridge of table land into the open prairie.
Finding an abundance of deer in the vicinity, we struck camp and made it our hunting-ground for the time being. Our efforts were very successful, and seldom a favorable day passed without giving us the skins and choice parts of two or more deer.
Nothing occurred to mar our enjoyment for the first two or three weeks, at which time my comrade, having unfortunately broken his gun-lock, was compelled to
