132 WATCHED BY WILD ANIMALS 
one afternoon changing a roll of films when the 
old beaver rose on the pond and swam to a 
half-submerged log about twenty feet away. 
I stopped film changing and sat still to watch 
him. He had not scented me. Splendid re- 
flections he and the surroundings made in the 
water; the snowy top of Mount Meeker, the 
blue sky, white clouds, brown willows, green; 
pointed pines, red birches, and a single young 
aspen with yellow leaves—a brilliant auto- 
chrome of autumn. 
The beaver rose from squatting and scratched 
himself behind a fore leg, combed himself with 
forepaws, then standing high on his hind feet 
held forepaws close to his breast and looked. 
around. A fly alighted on his nose. He struck 
at it. Again it alighted, and he brushed it 
away with the other forepaw. Again he squat- 
ted on the log but. facing in the opposite di- 
rection. A few minutes later he dived off 
showing his wide, webbed, gooselike hind feet, 
and striking the water a heavy, merry whack 
with his broad black rubbery tail, sending the 
ripples scurrying over the pond. 
The canal still remained empty, but with the 
completion of the house it would be filled from 
somewhere and used in bringing in the harvest. 
One day late in September I found the canal 
and the little basin at the south—the upper— 
