AMONG THE MUSKRAT LODGES 



are as available in winter as in summer. 

 Indeed some of his houses are built in the 

 autumn, not so much for winter homes 

 as restaurants where he may dine in seclu- 

 sion on these very mollusks. Quite a dis- 

 tance from the bog, over in a shallow part 

 of the pond, is a bed of these mussels with 

 a flat-topped rock near by rising above 

 the surface. Here last fall the muskrats 

 built a lodge, right on the rock, which 

 they used for this purpose. The first 

 skaters kicked this lodge to pieces. It 

 was fairly crammed with the empty shells 

 of many a rare feast, showing that here 

 Mussascus had undoubtedly entertained 

 his friends in true Bohemian style. 



So, while I shivered in the searching 

 east wind on the sky side of the ice, the 

 muskrats were well fed and comfortable 

 in a region of even higher temperature, 

 a country where the spring, which we say 

 229 



