THE LIFE OF A BEAVER COLONY 103 



hunted strive to outdo each other in alertness, 

 when tragedies were registered by the red seal of 

 blood where the victims fell. Nothing of all this 

 was known to the beaver who, housed so comfort- 

 ably by their own foresight and industry, lived in 

 complete peace, fearing nothing but man and otter 

 during this season so dreaded by the homeless. 

 Who shall say whether they even knew of the 

 many visits paid to their lodge by wolverines, lynx, 

 fishers and wolves ? These hunger-driven creatures 

 could smell the hidden beaver as the scent rose 

 from the house, and their tell-tale footprints on the 

 fresh-fallen snow showed how often they approached 

 the house as though in hope of finding some unex- 

 pected way of getting into it. Well they knew 

 that their visits were fruitless, for not even the 

 powerful wolf could dig his way through the ice- 

 bound, tangled walls. Perhaps the beaver could 

 hear or smell their foolish visitors ; if so they must 

 have experienced unbounded satisfaction in the 

 knowledge of their self-made security, which was 

 the result of so much hard work and skill. 



Winter at last began to give way to the lengthen- 

 ing hours of sunshine. The weather ceased to be 

 so piercingly cold, and the throbbing shafts of light 

 from the aurora borealis no longer brightened the 

 sky at night. The snow became soft and slushy, 

 and the ice broke away from the banks of lakes and 

 rivers. As the streams, fed by all this melting 

 material, grew with alarming speed, the stillness of 



