132 WILD SPORTS IN THE SOUTH. 



osier's round tapering wand, the bayonet flags and the sedge grass 

 appear above the tide and point the way the current flows. This 

 is the playground of our friend. You may see him here when the 

 moon is full, pulling the roots of the lilies, or the long eel-grass 

 that is growing beneath. You can hear his quick splash and dive, 

 and, by the rattle of the cat-tails and the shaking out of their floss, 

 you know he is chasing off the wild duck's brood that intrude on his 

 gardens. On the shore his paths are running hither and thither, 

 wherever a better grass can be found, or the seeds of grain that have 

 come down with the freshets have taken root, and on these grounds 

 which he is often compelled to cross, a deep hole is dug down to 

 the water, and connects with the brook, through which he will take 

 refuge if disturbed. At length, when the morning star shines dead, 

 and the cock's loud clarion comes from the farm, the provident 

 botanist bears away for his home, with his arms full of grass and 

 roots to lay up for a day of need. < 



It often occurs that my friend has selected for his residence, 

 being allured by the wild beauty of the scene, some lake whose 

 shores do not present suitable accommodations for shelter. Either 

 they are so rocky as not to be pierced, or they are so low as to be 

 liable to be submerged with the spring rains. No more discrim- 

 inating judge of the security of such shores can be found than my 

 friend. No scenery fitness will tempt him. If there is any 

 liability of danger on shore he goes out to the centre of the lake, 

 or to a point in the lake from which he can readily obtain good 

 grass, and there he builds himself a house. Sometimes he takes 

 the end of a half-submerged log as a proper foundation. At other 

 times the bottom of the pond, and yet again he will take a mass of 

 weeds as an anchor, and construct on this slight support a house 

 that is to last for years. His bricks are eel-grass and twigs ; his 

 mortar is mud and clay ; he is his own architect, labourer, builder, 

 contractor, and upholsterer. Gradually the house progresses, with- 

 out shaped like a dome, and within divided into many chambers. 

 The door is beneath the waters, and so nothing but a diver can 

 enter it, and being built on the open water, and at a distance from 

 shore, nothmg will attack it from above. It is formed and 

 fashioned with a precision that no science can excel. In and 



