The pole-cat is an offensive animal, and some dogs will not touch them, and those that do are frequently obliged to put their noses into the earth to get rid of the scent; {192} they are not so numerous as the two last mentioned. Ground-hogs are scarcer; I have seen but one; it was larger than a large cat; it had a large head, that a little resembled the head of a pig; in colour like an English badger; the legs very short, with long strong claws. It was fat, and said to be good eating; the person who had it did not eat it, but stripped it for the sake of its skin, which he was going to tan, to make shoes for his wife. He put it into some very strong lye, to take off the hair, and afterwards he intended to put it into a vat with some oak-bark. I have seen several of the Americans tanning hides and skins, in a trough made from a large tree, the inside hollowed out, and the skins put in and covered with some small pieces of oak-bark and water. These troughs are covered to keep off the sun and rain. I do not know how long they are in tanning their skins, but I have not, any where in America, seen any good leather of their own manufacturing.
{193} Ground-squirrels are handsome little animals, mostly running on the earth, fallen trees, and rails, and are as mischievous as rats. Tree-squirrels are of two or more sorts, and are eaten here. A party of eight Americans, in May this year, had a squirrel hunt, for a trifling wager. They were equally divided, and started at day-light with their rifles; and that party which produced most squirrels by the middle of the next day, was to win the wager. They each took a different ground to hunt on, each had a man to attend him to see all was fair. Three of them hunted on and near my land. I knew them all; and I saw one of them several times during the hunt; he was of the winning side, he killed 41; the whole number killed by his party was 152; by the other, 141; total 293. Although more than 100 squirrels were killed on my farm and near it, it did not appear greatly to lessen them.
Deer are not very numerous. I suppose, I have seen about 100, but never more than {194} five or six together. I bought several in the winter, the greater part without their skins, at one dollar each, but one or two higher; one weighed more than 100 lb. weight. They generally weigh from 60 lb. to 100 lb. A good skin is worth 50 cents: their horns, though large, are of no value here.
To the north of us there are buffaloes and elks; also beavers and otters on the rivers.
Rabbits are tolerably plentiful, smaller than the English rabbit; their skins are weaker, and their flesh is not so white, but it is more moist and tender. They do not burrow in the earth, but when hunted run into the hollow trees, so that an axe is necessary in rabbit hunting. The weakness of their claws is, I suppose, the reason they do not burrow in the earth.
I before mentioned picking up a land-tortoise in my journey to the Prairies, but tortoises are not numerous by any means. I have never seen one more than seven {195} inches over. Their shells are hard, strong, and beautifully clouded. I kept one several days in a tub; it had a young one, about an inch over; but somebody overturned the tub, and I lost my tortoises. There are a few moles, much like the English.
We have the following reptiles; namely, rattle-snakes, copper-heads, black, garter, and water-snakes; and a great quantity of frogs in wet places, and they make a great noise in a warm evening, but in a dry season we see or hear but little of them.
A few rattle-snakes and copper-heads are sometimes seen, but I have not heard of any person or animal being hurt by them.
The black, water, and garter-snakes, all said to be harmless: the black snakes are often six feet long. I have heard of their twining themselves round a man's leg so hard that he could scarcely move. I have seen many of them, and two dead rattle-snakes. But wild beasts and reptiles are but little more thought of or dreaded than in England.
{196} The birds are turkeys, turkey-buzzards, prairie-fowls, quails, pigeons, doves, wild-geese, wild-ducks, wood-cocks, snipes, blackbirds, mocking-birds, red-birds, yellow-birds, humming-birds, wipperwills, blue-jays, paroquets, larks, wood-peckers, black-martins, and a few other small birds. But birds are not so numerous as in England; some of them have very beautiful plumage, but not many of them are birds of song.