not forever to remain immune from the wiles of 

 man, and one day it was planted with that bar- 

 baric, cruel torture-machine, the steel trap. 



A cultured consumptive, who had returned 

 temporarily to nature, was boarding at a ranch 

 house several miles away. While out riding he 

 discovered the colony and at once resolved to 

 depopulate it. The beaver ignored his array of 

 traps until he enlisted the services of an old 

 trapper, whose skill sent most of the beaver to 

 their death before the sepia-colored catkins ap- 

 peared upon the aspens. Flat-top escaped. 



The ruinous raid of the trappers was followed 

 by a dry season, and during the drouth a rancher 

 down the mountain came up prospecting for 

 water. He cut a ditch in the outlet ridge of the 

 lake, and out gushed the water. He started home 

 in a cheerful mood, but long before he arrived, 

 the "first engineers" had blocked his ditch. Dur- 

 ing the next few days and nights the rancher 

 made many trips from his house to the lake, 

 and when he was not in the ditch, swearing, and 

 opening it, the beaver were in it shutting off 

 the water. 



189 



