106 ROMANCE OF THE BEAVER 
In less than three weeks, they made their bow to the 
great outdoor world, swimming about without effort 
or fear, in evident enjoyment of the bright sunlight 
that was such a contrast to their dark home. A short 
swim sufficed for the first day, and one by one, of 
their own accord, they dived (without having to 
be taught as our fanciful writers would make us 
believe) and returned to their lodge to dry off and 
sleep after these first exertions. 
The day and weeks that followed were filled 
with the joy of living. Spring flowers blossomed 
and passed to give way to later ones, the birds 
returned from their winter journeys in the balmy 
south, and filled the green-clad forests with their 
varied songs. It was their season of courtship and 
nest-building, all following the laws of their kind 
with a precision that no man can understand. At 
a certain time the home of each particular species 
would be completed, nor did they vary more than 
a few days from one year to another. What 
almanacs did they consult that they should be so 
exact? Yet had they not arrived, each species at 
its own exact time, all arrayed in their brightest 
dress, whether of yellow, blue or scarlet, or the 
more sombre hues, to stay in the northern land for 
a definite period and for a definite purpose? The 
young beavers played about to the music of the 
woodland birds, yet no one dare say that they paid 
the slightest attention even to that most exquisite 
of songsters, the hermit thrush, whose rich, full 
