Thoreau writes in his journal:
4.30 P. M.—At Jonathan Buffum’s, Lynn. Lecture in John B. Alley’s parlor. Mr. J. Buffum describes to me ancient wolf-traps, made probably by the early settlers in Lynn, perhaps after an Indian model; one some two miles from the shore near Saugus, another more northerly; holes say seven feet deep, about as long, and some three feet wide, stoned up very smoothly, and perhaps converging a little, so that the wolf could not get out. Tradition says that a wolf and a squaw were one morning found in the same hole, staring at each other.
Cambridge, Mass. Thoreau checks out Collections of the New York Historical Society 2nd series, volumes 2 and 3, Jesuit Relations for 1662-1663, and Jesuit Relations for 1663-1664 from Harvard College Library (Emerson the Essayist, 2:197).
