In The Course Of Time, Their Habitations Bear
The Appearance Of A Grove Of Willow Trees, Rude And Natural Without,
But Artfully Constructed Within.
This animal can remain in or under
water at its pleasure, like the frog or seal, who shew, by the
smoothness or roughness of their skins, the flux and reflux of the
sea.
These three animals, therefore, live indifferently under the
water, or in the air, and have short legs, broad bodies, stubbed
tails, and resemble the mole in their corporal shape. It is worthy
of remark, that the beaver has but four teeth, two above, and two
below, which being broad and sharp, cut like a carpenter's axe, and
as such he uses them. They make excavations and dry hiding places
in the banks near their dwellings, and when they hear the stroke of
the hunter, who with sharp poles endeavours to penetrate them, they
fly as soon as possible to the defence of their castle, having first
blown out the water from the entrance of the hole, and rendered it
foul and muddy by scraping the earth, in order thus artfully to
elude the stratagems of the well-armed hunter, who is watching them
from the opposite banks of the river. When the beaver finds he
cannot save himself from the pursuit of the dogs who follow him,
that he may ransom his body by the sacrifice of a part, he throws
away that, which by natural instinct he knows to be the object
sought for, and in the sight of the hunter castrates himself, from
which circumstance he has gained the name of Castor; and if by
chance the dogs should chase an animal which had been previously
castrated, he has the sagacity to run to an elevated spot, and there
lifting up his leg, shews the hunter that the object of his pursuit
is gone.
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