of $* 



about halfway there he wheeled suddenly and 

 took an uneasy survey of the open he had tra- 

 versed, as though he had heard an enemy be- 

 hind. Then with apparently stolid indifference 

 he went on leisurely, and for a time paused 

 among the cutters, which did nothing to indi- 

 cate that they realized his presence. He ate 

 some bark from? a green limb on the ground, 

 moved on, and went into the hole beneath me. 

 He appeared so large that I afterward measured 

 the distance between the two aspens where he 

 paused. He was not less than three and a half 

 feet long and probably weighed fifty pounds. 

 He had all his toes; there was no white spot on 

 his body; in fact, there was neither mark nor 

 blemish by which I could positively identify 

 him. Yet I feel that in my month around the 

 colony I beheld the patriarch of the first even- 

 ing in several scenes of action. 



Sixty-seven minutes after the second beaver 

 began cutting he made a brief pause; then he 

 suddenly thudded the ground with his tail, 

 hurriedly took out a few more chips, and ran 

 away, with the other two beaver a little in 



64 



