“Are there any animals in that house now?”
“I don’t know whether there are any animals, sir; there might be some sort of animals, but there are not any rats.”
“Where are the rats, then?”
“They all disappear in summer; they leave their houses, and in the fall build new ones. I can’t tell what becomes of them; but they have queer ways. They build a big house—a sort of family house, as I call it—where a number of them dwell; and around it, about fifty rods off, smaller ones, where each rat appears to feed or go when he wants to be alone. There are generally two entrances, one above and the other under water, so that when the bay is frozen over they can get in.”
“How do you catch them?”
“We set spring-traps of iron, but without teeth, so as not to hurt the skin, near their houses, and where we think they will be apt to step into them. The time to catch them is from the 1st of March till the 10th of April.”
“Can anybody trap them?”
“Oh no, sir; that wouldn’t do at all; a person has to own the land, or have the right to trap. The land isn’t worth much, though—only about a dollar an acre.”
“The Indian name of muskrat is said to be musksquash?”
“I don’t know how that is; but I have heard people call them so. There are a good many in the marsh, and we sometimes make three or four hundred dollars a year from them.”