1771. December.
So far are the beaver from driving stakes into the ground when building their houses, that they lay most of the wood crosswise, and nearly horizontal, and without any other order than that of leaving a hollow or cavity in the middle; when any unnecessary branches project inward, they cut them off with their teeth, and throw them in among the rest, to prevent the mud from falling through the roof. It is a mistaken notion, that the wood-work is first completed and then plaistered; for the whole of their houses, as well as their dams, are from the foundation one mass of wood and mud, mixed with stones, if they can be procured. The mud is always taken from the edge of the bank, or the bottom of the creek or pond, near the door of the house; and though their fore-paws are so small, yet it is held close up between them, under their throat, {234} that they carry both mud and stones; while they always drag the wood with their teeth.
All their work is executed in the night; and they are so expeditious in completing it, that in the course of one night I have known them to have collected as much mud at their houses as to have amounted to some thousands of their little handfuls; and when any mixture of grass or straw has appeared in it, it has been, most assuredly, mere chance, owing to the nature of the ground from which they had taken it. As to their designedly making a composition for that purpose, it is entirely void of truth.
1771. December.
It is a great piece of policy in those animals, to cover, or plaister, as it is usually called, the outside of their houses every fall with fresh mud, and as late as possible in the Autumn, even when the frost becomes pretty severe; as by this means it soon freezes as hard as a stone, and prevents their common enemy, the quiquehatch, from disturbing them during the Winter. And as they are frequently seen to walk over their work, and sometimes to give a flap with their tail, particularly when plunging into the water, this has, without doubt, given rise to the vulgar opinion that they use their tails as a trowel, with which they plaister their houses; whereas that flapping of the tail is no more than a custom, which they always preserve, even when they become tame and domestic, and more particularly so when they are startled.
{235} Their food chiefly consists of a large root, something resembling a cabbage-stalk, which grows at the bottom of the lakes and rivers. They eat also the bark of trees, particularly that of the poplar, birch, and willow; but the ice preventing them from getting to the land in Winter, they have not any barks to feed upon during that season, except that of such sticks as they cut down in Summer, and throw into the water opposite the doors of their houses; and as they generally eat a great deal, the roots above mentioned constitute a chief part of their food during the Winter. In Summer they vary their diet, by eating various kinds of herbage, and such berries as grow near their haunts during that season.
When the ice breaks up in the Spring, the beaver always leave their houses, and rove about the whole Summer, probably in search of a more commodious situation; but in case of not succeeding in their endeavours, they return again to their old habitations a little before the fall of the leaf, and lay in their Winter stock of woods. They seldom begin to repair the houses till the frost commences, and never finish the outer-coat till the cold is pretty severe, as hath been already mentioned.
1771. December.
When they shift their habitations, or when the increase of their number renders it necessary to make some addition to their houses, or to erect new ones, they begin felling {236} the wood for these purposes early in the Summer, but seldom begin to build till the middle or latter end of August, and never complete their houses till the cold weather be set in.
Notwithstanding what has been so repeatedly reported of those animals assembling in great bodies, and jointly erecting large towns, cities, and commonwealths, as they have sometimes been called, I am confident, from many circumstances, that even where the greatest numbers of beaver are situated in the neighbourhood of each other, their labours are not carried on jointly in the erection of their different habitations, nor have they any reciprocal interest, except it be such as live immediately under the same roof; and then it extends no farther than to build or keep a dam which is common to several houses. In such cases it is natural to think that every one who receives benefit from such dams, should assist in erecting it, being sensible of its utility to all.