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 



