Each trapper had ten steel traps allowed him. These he set every
night, and visited every morning, sometimes oftener when practicable,
selecting a spot in the stream where many trees had been cut down by
beavers for the purpose of damming up the water. In some places as
many as fifty tree stumps were seen in one spot, within the compass of
half an acre, all cut through at about eighteen inches from the
root. We may remark, in passing, that the beaver is very much like a
gigantic water-rat, with this marked difference, that its tail is very
broad and flat like a paddle. The said tail is a greatly-esteemed
article of food, as, indeed, is the whole body at certain seasons of
the year. The beaver's fore legs are very small and short, and it uses
its paws as hands to convey food to its mouth, sitting the while in an
erect position on its hind legs and tail. Its fur is a dense coat of
a grayish-coloured down, concealed by long coarse hair, which lies
smooth, and is of a bright chestnut colour. Its teeth and jaws are of
enormous power; with them it can cut through the branch of a tree as
thick as a walking-stick at one snap, and, as we have said, it gnaws
through thick trees themselves.
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