340 A BOOK-LOVER'S HOLIDAYS 



not thirty feet from us; and scaup-ducks and 

 once a grown brood of dusky mallard drifted 

 and swam by only a little farther off. The 

 beaver kept slapping the water with their 

 broad trowel-tails, evidently in play; where 

 they are wary they often dive without slapping 

 the water. No bull appeared, but a cow moose 

 with two calves came down to the lake, di- 

 rectly opposite us, at one in the afternoon and 

 spent two hours in the water. Near where the 

 three of them entered the lake was a bed of 

 tall, coarse reed-grass standing well above the 

 water. Earlier in the season this had been 

 grazed by moose, but these three did not touch 

 it. The cow, having entered the water, did not 

 leave. She fed exclusively with her head under 

 water. Wading out until only the ridge of her 

 back was above the surface, and at times find- 

 ing that the mud bothered even her long legs, 

 she plunged her huge homely head to the bot- 

 tom, coming up with between her jaws big 

 tufts of dripping bottom-grass — the moose 

 grass — or the roots and stems of other plants. 

 After a time she decided to change her station, 

 and, striking off into deep water, she swam half 

 a mile farther down the lake. She swam well 

 and powerfully, but sunk rather deep in the 

 water, only her head and the ridge of her withers 



