other runways, did likewise at other places. Several of the
passageways led to the bank, where, Oo-koo-hoo said, they had what is
called "bank lodges"--natural cavities in the river bank to which the
beavers had counted on resorting in case their house was raided. In
other places, where the snow obscured the view, the Indians knocked on
the ice with the backs of their axes, to find and follow the
hollow-sounding ice that told of runways below, that other stakes might
be driven down. The rapping sound, however, instead of driving the
beavers out of their lodge, had a tendency to make them remain at home,
for as Oo-koo-hoo explained, cutting ice and working around their homes
does not always frighten the beavers.

Securing two stouter poles, the hunters now chopped the butts into
wedge-shaped chisels, with which they proposed to break open the
beavers' lodge. Work was begun about a foot above the level of the
snow on the south side, as they explained that the lodge would not only
be thinner on that side, but that the sun would make it slightly
softer, too--and before much headway was made the dogs, all alert,
discovered that several of the beavers had rushed out of their house,
but finding the passageways blocked had returned home.

Now, strange to say, as soon as the side of the house was broken open
and daylight let in, the beavers, becoming curious over the inflowing
light that dazzled their eyes, actually came toward the newly made hole
to investigate. Then Oo-koo-hoo, with the aid of a crooked stick,
suddenly jerked one of the unsuspecting animals out of the hole and
Amik knocked it on the head. Thus they secured four large ones, but
left a number of smaller ones unharmed, as Oo-koo-hoo never made a
practice of taking a whole family.