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Updated: June 3, 2025
If squirrels and rats and rabbits were too nimble at first, there are plenty of musquash to be caught, and he need not stop at a fawn or a sheep, for he is enormously strong, and the grip of his jaws is not to be loosened. In severe winters, when fish are scarce or his pools frozen over, he takes to the woods boldly and shows himself a master at hunting craft.
The rabbit, too, was not slow to learn the taste of its twigs and bark; and when the fruit was ripe, the squirrel half-rolled, half-carried it to his hole; and even the musquash crept up the bank from the brook at evening, and greedily devoured it, until he had worn a path in the grass there; and when it was frozen and thawed, the crow and the jay were glad to taste it occasionally.
There was a look of surprise in his face that I had blundered onto a discovery which he had looked for many times in vain, his traps on his back. "Das a portash," he said simply. "A portage! But who made a portage here?" "Well, Musquash he prob'ly make-um first. Den beaver, den h'otter, den everybody in hurry he make-um. You see, river make big bend here.
Always muskeg marks the limit of big game and the beginning of the ground of the little fellows waupoos, the rabbit; and musquash, the muskrat; and sakwasew, the mink; and nukik, the otter; and wuchak or pekan, the fisher.
Then there'll be the mischief to pay. But I hope it won't be any one of you boys." Each and every one of them solemnly declared that he was firmly resolved to be unusually careful. Finally they reached the cabin. In the afternoon Old Jim skinned the three musquash, and showed the boys how he fastened the hides on stretching boards, which would cause them to retain their shape while they dried.
Jerry and Will watched their comrade bravely take a portion of the musquash. "How is it?" asked Jerry, for there had not been enough of the venison after all to appease their appetites. "Bully. Just try for yourselves. I've eaten much worse dishes right at home," was the immediate reply of the stout-hearted Frank. Old Jesse chuckled and gave him a look of appreciation.
"We never put skins in the sun or near a fire to dry," he observed, seeing that most of the boys were anxious to learn all they could. "The best way is to stand 'em in the shade where the breeze can play on 'em. But, of course, you mustn't let the pelts get wet while they're drying." Sure enough, Jim cut up the musquash, and gave evidences of satisfaction at finding them so plump.
The Musquash, or Musk-rat, is undoubtedly a beaver, and has been called at times the Little Beaver; but it has pleased the naturalists to constitute it a genus of itself, though there is only the one species known.
Dugald Cameron, one of the partners of the North-West Company, on whom Mr. Back and I called soon after our arrival, and were honoured with a salute of musquetry. These establishments are small, but said to be well situated for procuring furs; as the numerous creeks in their vicinity are much resorted to by the beaver, otter, and musquash.
Musquash is said to be an Indian appellative a strange coincidence, as the word, "musk" is of Arabic origin, and "musquash" would seem a compound of the French musque, as the early Canadian fur-traders were French, or of French descent, and fixed the nomenclature of most of the fur-bearing animals of that region.
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