, he would drown for want of air.
Although an amphibious animal, like the beaver and otter, he cannot live
altogether under water, and must rise at intervals to take breath. The
running stream in winter does not perhaps furnish him with his favourite
food--the roots and stems of water-plants. These the swamp affords to
his satisfaction; besides, it gives him security from the attacks of men
and preying animals, as the wolverine and fisher. Moreover, his house
in the swamp cannot be easily approached by the hunter--man--except when
the ice becomes very thick and strong. Then, indeed, is the season of
peril for the muskrat, but even then he has loopholes of escape. How
cunningly this creature adapts itself to its geographical situation! In
the extreme north--in the hyperborean regions of the Hudson's Bay
Company--lakes, rivers, and even springs freeze up in winter. The
shallow marshes become solid ice, congealed to their very bottoms. How
is the muskrat to get under water there? Thus, then, he manages the
matter:--

Upon deep lakes, as soon as the ice becomes strong enough to bear his
weight, he makes a hole in it, and over this he constructs his
dome-shaped habitation, bringing the materials up through the hole, from
the bottom of the lake. The house thus formed sits prominently upon the
ice. Its entrance is in the floor--the hole which has already been
made--and thus is kept open during the whole season of frost, by the
care and watchfulness of the inmates, and by their passing constantly
out and in to seek their food--the water-plants of the lake.

This peculiar construction of the muskrat's dwelling, with its
water-passage, would afford all the means of escape from its ordinary
enemies--the beasts of prey--and, perhaps, against these alone nature
has instructed it to provide. But with all its cunning it is, of
course, outwitted by the superior ingenuity of its enemy--man.

The food of the muskrat is varied. It loves the roots of several
species of _nymphae_, but its favourite is _calamus_ root (_calamus_ or
_acorus aromaticus_). It is known to eat shell-fish, and heaps of the
shells of fresh-water muscles (_unios_) are often found near its
retreat. Some assert that it eats fish, but the same assertion is made
with regard to the beaver. This point is by no means clearly made out;
and the closet naturalists deny it, founding their opposing theory, as
usual, upon the teeth. For my part, I have but litt