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These Indians have likewise their priests, or conjurers, or medicine men, who pretend to be in the confidence of the deities, and the expounders and enforcers of their will. Each of these medicine men has his idols carved in wood, representing the spirits of the air and of the fire, under some rude and grotesque form of a horse, a bear, a beaver, or other quadruped, or that of bird or fish.
The savage tribes were divided into several great familes, each distinguished by the name of some animal chosen by the chief as his totum or distinctive mark. Among the Iroquois, for instance, the highest family was that of the Tortoise; the second of the Beaver, and the third of the Wolf. In battle, the totum was borne as the standard.
This animal presents a startling appearance to the observer who witnesses it for the first time. It resembles a beaver, having a soft furry coat, but also has a horny, flat bill like a duck, its feet being webbed, but also furnished with claws projecting over the edge of the web-foot.
"That's a skin that will be worth something," said Dick, "and here are more, but before we begin the work of taking them off, you'll have to be braced up, Al. You need a stimulant." He hurried back to Castle Howard and brought one of the bottles of whisky, a little store that they had never touched except in the compounding of the barkstone for the capture of beaver.
So Messasebe, having traveled many miles, came to a country inhabited by the slow snake, by the otter, and the beaver, the panther, the deer, the bear many children whom he long had loved.
Thus they fought two hours and more, till the ground where they fought was all bepurpled with blood. Then at the last Sir Turquine waxed sore faint, and gave somewhat aback, and bare his shield full low for weariness. That spied Sir Launcelot, and leapt then upon him fiercely as a lion, and took him by the beaver of his helmet, and drew him down on his knees.
You should have seen old Madam Clarissa Bowdoin, who came to call yesterday, with a fine sleigh and driver and footman. She just holds on to this world's good things, I tell you, and she's past seventy. My, how she was trigged out in a black satin pelisse lined with fur! And she had a black beaver bonnet or hat, whatever you call it, with a big bow on top, and two black feathers flying.
The British merchant's hat was instantly off his head, and the owner of the beaver was making a prodigious number of bows, as if a crown-prince were before him. "Gracious powers, Mr. Warrington! This is a delight, indeed! What a crowning mercy that your voyage should have been so prosperous! You have my boat to go on shore. Let me cordially and respectfully welcome you to England!
He owned eleven square leagues of land, four thousand two hundred cattle, two thousand horses, and about as many sheep. His trade in beaver skins was most profitable. He maintained a force of trappers who were always welcome at his fort, and whom he generously kept without cost to themselves.
The men go naked and wear their hair short; they pierce their noses, from which, as well as from their ears, hang beads.... Their cabins are made of bark, and are long and wide. They sleep at the two ends, which are raised two feet above the ground. They know nothing of the beaver, and their wealth consists in the skins of wild cattle.
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