AN OPEN SEASON 213 



year a story about a bear rushing hungry from 

 his hibernating den and assailing a man with the 

 intention of ferociously eating him. 



Just now bears are becoming scarce and there 

 is need for every boy to understand them. Bears 

 are practically harmless; they eat many pests; 

 they are among the most interesting of animals; 

 and they are in danger of extermination. 



Sometimes I hope to find a beaver family 

 two grown ones and several children who 

 understand English, that I may read to them a 

 number of statements that have been printed 

 about beavers. These would be: . 

 Beavers are always at work. 

 They live on fish. 

 They regulate the weather. 

 They use their tails for trowels and hammers. 



In a standard encyclopedia printed about ten 

 years ago we read that beavers make a dam by 

 driving stakes in a line across a stream, and then 

 weave willows and small trees between these 

 stakes. These stakes, too, where the water is 

 strong, are sometimes as thick as a man's thigh. 

 This same story was printed in another book 

 about four hundred years ago. 



Beavers have good teeth and could sharpen a 

 stake of this kind, but what kind of a club, maul, 

 or hammer one would use in driving it down has 

 not been told; although one book about two 



