Page:History of Oregon Literature.djvu/78

 hunters. When a beaver, male or female, leaves the lodge to swim about their pond, they go to the bottom and fetch up some mud between their forepaws and breast, carry it on the bank and emit upon it a small quantity of castorium. Another beaver passing the place does the same, and should a hundred beaver pass within the scent of the place, they would each throw up mud covering up the old castorium and emit new upon that which they had thrown up. The trapper extracts this substance from the gland and carries it in a wooden box. He sets his trap in the water near the bank about six inches below the surface, throws a handful of mud upon the bank about one foot from it and puts a small portion of the castorium thereon. After night the beaver comes out of his lodge, smells the fatal bait 200 or 300 yards distant and steers his course directly for it. He hastens to ascend the bank, but the trap grasps his foot and soons drowns him in the struggle to escape, for the beaver, though termed an amphibious animal, cannot respire beneath the water.