our of starting, and at night when he came back leading his horse,
which always groaned under its heavy load of meat. Henri, being a
hearty, jovial soul and fond of society, usually kept with the main
body. As for Dick, he was everywhere at once, at least as much so as
it is possible for human nature to be! His horse never wearied; it
seemed to delight in going at full speed; no other horse in the troop
could come near Charlie, and Dick indulged him by appearing now at
the front, now at the rear, anon in the centre, and frequently
_nowhere_!--having gone off with Crusoe like a flash of lightning
after a buffalo or a deer. Dick soon proved himself to be the best
hunter of the party, and it was not long before he fulfilled his
promise to Crusoe and decorated his neck with a collar of grizzly bear
claws. Well, when the trappers came to a river where there were signs
of beaver they called a halt, and proceeded to select a safe and
convenient spot, near wood and water, for the camp. Here the property
of the band was securely piled in such a manner as to form a
breastwork or slight fortification, and here Walter Cameron
established headquarters. This was always the post of danger, being
exposed to sudden attack by prowling savages, who often dogged the
footsteps of the party in their journeyings to see what they could
steal. But Cameron was an old hand, and they found it difficult to
escape his vigilant eye.

From this point all the trappers were sent forth in small parties
every morning in various directions, some on foot and some on
horseback, according to the distances they had to go; but they never
went farther than twenty miles, as they had to return to camp every
evening.

Each trapper had ten steel traps allowed him. These he set every
night, and visited every morning, sometimes oftener when practicable,
selecting a spot in the stream where many trees had been cut down by
beavers for the purpose of damming up the water. In some places as
many as fifty tree stumps were seen in one spot, within the compass of
half an acre, all cut through at about eighteen inches from the
root. We may remark, in passing, that the beaver is very much like a
gigantic water-rat, with this marked difference, that its tail is very
broad and flat like a paddle. The said tail is a greatly-esteemed
article of food, as, indeed, is the whole body at certain seasons of
the year. The beaver's fore legs are very small and short, and it uses
its pa