58 THE DRAMA OF THE FORESTS 



meat was cut up and hung from the branches of a tree, it was 

 time to sit around the fire and have our evening talk. 



But Oo-koo-hoo, slipping away in his hunting canoe, paddled 

 up a little creek into a small lake in which he knew a colony of 

 beavers lived. He was gone about an hour and upon his return 

 he told us about it. On gaining the little mere, he, without 

 removing his paddle from the water, propelled his canoe slowly 

 and silently along the shore in the shadow of the overhanging 

 trees, until a large beaver lodge appeared in the rising mist; 

 and then standing up in his canoe — in order to get a better 

 view — he became motionless. Minutes passed while the rising 

 moon cast golden ripples upon the water, and two beavers, 

 rising from below, swam toward and mounted the roof of their 

 island home. Then, while the moonlight faded and glowed, 

 other beavers appeared and swam hither and thither; some 

 hauling old barkless poles, others bringing freshly cut poplar 

 branches, and all busily engaged. A twig snapping behind 

 the hunter, he turned his head, and as he caught a vanishing 

 glimpse of a lynx in a tree, he was instantly startled by a tre- 

 mendous report and a splashing upheaval of water beside his 

 canoe. A beaver had been swimming there, and on seeing the 

 hunter move, had struck the water with its powerful tail, to 

 warn its mates before it dived. The lynx had been watching 

 the beaver. 



"Did you bring back anything?" 



"No, my son," Oo-koo-hoo replied, "that hunting-ground 

 belongs to an old friend of mine." 



WOODCRAFT OF TRAILING 



After a while the subject of woodcraft arose. When I in- 

 quired as to how I could best locate the north in case I happened 

 to be travelling on a cloudy day without a compass, the old 

 hunter replied, that though he never used a compass, he found 



