In the meantime cats are embarrassed with their civet, whereof they rid themselves by rubbing against trees, and evince friendship for those who, in the sheepfold, rub it off with a spoon. But in addition to other wild animals WVew Netherland furnishes, according to the occular evidence of Adriaen van der Donk, full eighty thousand beavers a year. Pliny relateshow these animals castrate themselves, and leave these parts to the hunters, inasmuch as they are much sought after, being an effectual remedy for mania, retention of the afterbirth, amenorrhea, dizziness, gout, lameness, belly and tooth aches, 'dulhiess of vision,

poisoning and rheumatism. But Pliny commits a Descripmakable, rave error; for the Beavers have very small testipauure ofthe cles fastened in such a manner to the back bone

that they cannot remove them except with life. Moreover, they live in the water and on land together in troops, in houses built of timber over a running stream, The houses excite

Pliny, lib. 32 cap. 3.

ee

DESCRIPTION OF NEW NETHERLAND. 121

no common admiration ; they are thus constructed--the Beavers first collect together all the drift wood which they find along the river, and whenever this falls short, they gnaw away, in the next adjoining wood, the sweetest bark all around with the front teeth, of which they have two in the upper, and two in the lower gum, they then cut right around the trunk until the tree falls; when they also shorten the pieces in like manner, to adapt them to the proposed building. The females carry the pieces on the back, the males support it behind so that it may not fall off. The houses rise ingeniously to the height of five stories; they are smeared above with clay to protect them from the rain ; in the middle is a convenient aperture through which to dive into the water as soon as they perceive any person.