Beaver, in zoology, a genus of quadrupeds belonging to the order of glires. The fore-teeth of the upper jaw are truncated, and hollowed in a transverse angular direction. The tops of the fore-teeth of the lower jaw lie in a transverse direction; and the tail is depressed. There are three species of castor, viz.
1. The fiber, or common beaver, with a plain ovated tail, is found on the banks of the rivers in Europe, Asia, and America. It has short ears hid in the fur; a blunt nose; the fore-feet small, the hinder large: its length from nose to tail about three feet, tail about one foot. It is from the inguinal glands of this animal that the castor oil is obtained; it is contained in cuds or pouches resembling a dog's testicles. Nothing equals the art with which these animals construct their dwellings. They choose a level piece of ground, with a small rivulet running through it. This they form into a pond, by making a dam across; first by driving into the ground stakes of five or six feet in length, placed in rows, wattling each row with plant twigs, and filling the interstices with clay, ramming it down close. The side next the water is sloped, the other perpendicular; cular; the bottom is from ten to twelve feet thick; but the thickness gradually diminishes to the top, which is about two or three; the length of these dams is sometimes not less than 100 feet.
Their houses are made in the water collected by means of the dam, and are placed near the edge of the shore. They are built on piles; are either round or oval; but their tops are vaulted, so that their inside resembles an oven, the top a dome. The walls are two feet thick, made of earth, stones, and sticks, most artificially laid together; and the walls within as neatly plastered as if with a trowel. In each house are two openings, the one into the water, the other towards the land. The height of these houses above the water is eight feet. They often make two or three stories in each dwelling, for the convenience of change in case of floods. Each house contains from 20 to 30 beavers; and the number of houses in each pond is from 10 to 25. Each beaver forms its bed of moss; and each family forms its magazine of winter provisions, which consist of bark and boughs of trees. Those they lodge under water, and fetch into their apartments as occasion requires. Lawson says, they are fondest of the sassafras, ash, and sweet gum. Their summer food is leaves, fruits, and sometimes crabs and craw fish; but they are not fond of fish.
To effect these works, a community of two or three hundred assembles; each bears his share in the labour; some fall to gnawing with their teeth trees of great size, to form beams or piles; others roll the pieces along to the water; others dive, and with their feet scrape holes in order to place them in; while others exert their efforts to rear them in their proper places; another party is employed in collecting twigs to wattle the piles with; a third in collecting earth, stones, and clay; a fourth is busied in beating and tempering the mortar; others in carrying it on their broad tails to proper places, and with the same instrument ram it between the piles, or plaster the inside of their houses. A certain number of smart strokes given with their tails, is a signal made by the overseer for repairing to such and such places, either for mending any defects, or at the approach of an enemy; and the whole society attend to it with the utmost assiduity. Their time of building is early in summer; for in winter they never stir but to their magazines of provisions, and during that season are very fat. They breed once a-year, and bring forth at the latter end of the winter two or three young at a birth.
Besides these associated beavers, is another sort called terriers, which either want industry or sagacity to form houses like the others. They burrow in the banks of rivers, making their holes beneath the freezing depth of the water, and work up for a great number of feet. These also form their winter stock of provision.
Beavers vary in their colours; the finest are black, but the general colour is a chestnut brown, more or less dark; some have been found, but very rarely, white. The skins are a prodigious article of trade, being the foundation of the hat-manufactory. In 1763 were sold, in a single sale of the Hudson's bay company, 54,670 skins. They are distinguished by different names. Coat-beaver is what has been worn as coverlets by the Indians; Parchment-beaver, because the lower side resembles it; Stage-beaver is the worst, and is that which the Indians kill out of season, on their stages or journeys.
In hunting the beavers, the savages sometimes shoot them, always getting on the contrary side of the wind; for they are very shy, quick in hearing, and of a keen scent. This is generally done when the beavers are at work, or on shore feeding on poplar bark. If they hear any noise when at work, they immediately jump into the water, and continue there some time; and when they rise, it is at a distance from the place where they went in.
They sometimes are taken with traps; these are nothing but poplar sticks laid in a path near the water; which when the beaver begins to feed upon them, they cause a large log of wood to fall upon their necks, which is put in motion by their moving of the sticks, and consequently requires an ingenious contrivance. The savages generally prefer this way of taking them, because it does not damage their skins.
In the winter-time they break the ice in two places at a distance from the house, the one behind the other. Then they take away the broken ice with a kind of racket, the better to see where to place their stakes. They fasten their nets to these, which have large meshes, and sometimes are eighteen or twenty yards in length. When these are fixed, they proceed to demolish the house, and turn a dog therein; which terrifying the beaver, he immediately leaves it, and takes to the water; after which, he is soon entangled by the net.
2. The moschatus, with a long, compressed, lanceolated tail, and palmated feet. It has a long slender nose like that of a shrew-mouse; no external ears, and very small eyes. Length from nose to tail, seven inches; of the tail, eight. It is the water-rat of Chilus; and inhabits Lapland, Russia, the banks of the rivers Wolga and the Yaick. It never wanders far from the sides; is very slow in its pace; makes holes in the cliffs, with the entrance far beneath the lowest fall of the water; works upwards, but never to the surface, only high enough to be beyond the highest flow of the river; feeds on fish; is devoured by the pikes and fish, and gives those fish so strong a flavour of musk as to render them not eatable; has the same scent as the former, especially about the tail, out of which is expressed a sort of musk very much resembling the genuine kind. The skins are put into chests among clothes, to drive away moths. At Orenburgh the skins and tails sell for 15 or 20 copecks per hundred. They are so common near Nizhny Novgorod, that the peasants bring 500 a-piece to market, where they are sold for one ruble per hundred. The German name for these animals is biefem-ratte; the Russian, uyebozhol.
3. The zibethicus, or musk-rat, with a long, compressed, lanceolated tail, and the toes of the feet separated from each other. Length from nose to tail, one foot; of the tail, nine inches. This species inhabits North America, breeds three or four times in a year, and brings from three to six young ones at a time; during summer the male and female consort together; at the approach of winter they unite in families, and retire into small round edifices covered with a dome, formed of herbs and reeds cemented with with clay: at the bottom are several pipes through which they pass in search of food; for they do not form magazines like the beavers: during winter their habitations are covered many feet deep with snow and ice; but they creep out and feed on the roots beneath: they quit their old habitations annually, and form new ones: the fur is soft and much esteemed: the whole animal, during summer, has a most exquisite smell of musk, which it loses in winter: perhaps the scent is derived from the calamus aromaticus, a favourite food of this animal. Lescarbot says they are very good to eat.
in astronomy, a moiety of the constellation GEMINI; called also APOLLO. Its latitude northwards, for the year 1700, according to Hevelius, was 10° 4' 23"; and its longitude, of Cancer, 16° 4' 14". It is also called Rafalgenze, Apollo, Aphellan, Avellar, and Anelar.
CASTOR and POLLUX, in Pagan mythology. Jupiter having an amour with Leda, the wife of Tyndarus king of Sparta, in the form of a swan, she brought forth two eggs, each containing twins. From that impregnated by Jupiter proceeded Pollux and Helena, who were both immortal; from the other Castor and Clytemnestra, who being begot by Tyndarus were both mortal. They were all, however, called by the common name of Tyndaridae. These two brothers entered into an inviolable friendship: they went with the other noble youths of Greece in the expedition to Colchis, and, on several occasions, signalized themselves by their courage; but Castor being at length killed, Pollux obtained leave to share his own immortality with him; so that they are said to live and die alternately every day: for, being translated into the skies, they form the constellation of Gemini, one of which stars rises as the other sets.
A martial dance, called the Pyrrhic or Caistorian dance, was invented in honour of those deities whom the Cephelenes placed among the Dios Magni, and offered to them white lambs. The Romans also paid them particular honours on account of the assistance they are said to have given them in an engagement against the Latins; in which, appearing mounted on white horses, they turned the scale of victory in their favour, for which a temple was erected to them in the forum.