Nine Years a Captive/Chapter 6

1. Of the Beaver. The beaver has a very thick, strong neck; his fore teeth, which are two in the upper and two in the under jaw, are concave and sharp like a carpenter's gouge. Their side teeth are like a sheep's, for they chew the cud. Their legs are short, the claws something longer than in other creatures. The nails on the toes of their hind feet are flat like an ape's but joined together by a membrane, as those of the water-fowl, their tails broad and flat like the broad end of a paddle. Near their tails they have four bottles, two of which contain oil, the others gum; the necks of these meet in one common orifice. The latter of these bottles contain the proper castorum, and not the testicles, as some have fancied, for they are distinct and separate from them, in the males only; whereas the castorum and oil bottles are common to male and female. With this oil and gum they preen themselves; so that when they come out of the water it runs off of them, as it does from a fowl. They have four teats, which are on their breasts, so that they hug up their young and suckle them, as women do their infants. They have generally two, and sometimes four in a litter. I have seen seven or five in the matrix, but the Indians think it a strange thing to find so many in a litter; and they assert that when it so happens, the dam kills all but four. ​They are the most laborious creatures that I have met with. I have known them to build dams across a river, thirty or forty perches wide; with wood and mud, so as to flow many acres of land. In the deepest part of a pond so raised, they build their houses, round, in the figure of an Indian wigwam, eight or ten feet high, and six or eight in diameter on the floor, which is made descending to the water, the parts near the centre about four, and near the circumference between ten and twenty inches above the water. These floors are covered with strippings of wood, like shavings, On these they sleep with their tails in the water; and if the freshets rise, they have the advantage of rising on their floor to the highest part. They feed on the leaves and bark of trees, and pond lily roots. In the fall of the year they lay in their provisions for the approaching winter; cutting down trees great and small. With one end in their mouths they drag their branches near to their house, and sink many cords of it. (They will cut [gnaw] down trees of a fathom in circumference.) They have doors to go down to the wood under the ice. And in case the freshets rise, break down and carry off their store of wood, they often starve. They have a note for conversing, calling and warning each other when at work or feeding; and while they are at labor they keep out a guard, who upon the first approach of an enemy so strikes the water with his tail that he may be heard half a mile. This so alarms the rest that they are all silent, quit their labor, and are to be seen no more for that time. If the male or female die, the survivor seeks a mate, and conducts him or her to their house, and carry on affairs as above.

2. Of the Wolverene. [Gulo Luscus of L.] The wolverene is a very fierce and mischievous creature, about the bigness of a middling dog; having short legs, broad feet and very sharp claws, and in my opinion may be reckoned a species of cat. They will climb trees and wait for moose and other animals which feed below, and when opportunity presents, jump upon and strike their claws in them so fast that they will hang on them till they have gnawed the main nerve in their neck asunder, which causes their death. I have known many moose killed thus. I was once travelling a little way behind several Indians, and hearing them laugh merrily, when I came up I asked them the cause of their laughter. They showed me the track of a moose, and how a wolverene had climbed a tree, and where he had jumped off upon a moose. It so happened, that after the moose had taken several large leaps, it came under the branch of a tree, which striking the wolverene, broke his hold and tore him off; and by his tracks in the snow it appeared he went off another way, with short steps, as if he had been stunned by the blow that had broken his hold. The Indians imputed the accident to the cunning of the moose, and were wonderfully pleased that it had thus outwitted the mischievous wolverene.

These wolverenes go into wigwams which have been left for a time, scatter the things abroad, and most filthily pollute them with ordure. I have heard the Indians say that this animal has sometimes pulled their guns from under their heads while they were asleep, and left them so defiled. An Indian told me that having left his wigwam with sundry things on the scaffold, among which was a birchen flask containing several pounds of powder, he found at his return, much to his surprise and grief, that a wolverene had visited it, mounted the scaffold, hove down bag and baggage. The powder flask happening to fall into the fire, exploded, blowing up the wolverene, and scattering the wigwam in all directions. At length he found the creature, blind ​from the blast, wandering backward and forward, and he had the satisfaction of kicking and beating him about. This in a great measure made up their loss, and then they could contentedly pick up their utensils and rig out their wigwam.

3. Of the Hedgehog. [Histrix Dorsata, or Urchin, Urson?] Our hedgehog or urchin is about the bigness of a hog of six months old. His back, sides and tail are full of sharp quills, so that if any creature approach him, he will contract himself into a globular form, and when touched by his enemy, his quills are so sharp and loose in the skin they fix in the mouth of the adversary. They will strike with great force with their tails, so that whatever falls under the lash of them are certainly filled with their prickles; but that they shoot their quills, as some assert they do, is a great mistake, as respects the American hedgehog, and I believe as to the African hedgehog or porcupine, also. As to the former, I have taken them at all seasons of the year.

4. Of the Tortoise. It is needless to describe the fresh-water tortoise. whose form is so well known in all parts; but their manner of propagating their species is not so universally known, I have observed that sort of tortoise whose shell is about fourteen or sixteen inches wide. In their coition they may be heard half a mile, making a noise like a woman washing her linen with a batting staff. They lay their eggs in the sand, near some deep, still water, about a foot beneath the surface of the sand, with which they are very curious in covering them; so that there is not the least mixture of it amongst them, nor the least rising of sand on the beach where they are deposited. I have often searched for them with the Indians, by thrusting a stick into the sand at random, and brought up some part of an egg clinging to it; when, uncovering the place, we have found near one hundred and fifty in one nest. Both their eggs and flesh are good eating when boiled. I have observed a difference as to the length of time in which they are hatching, which is between twenty and thirty days; some sooner than others. Whether this difference ought to be imputed to the various quality or site of the sand in which they are laid, (as to the degree of cold or heat,) I leave to the conjecture of the virtuosi. As soon as they are hatched, the young tortoises break through the sand and betake themselves to the water, and, as far as I could discover, without any further care or help of the old ones.