122 ROMANCE OF THE BEAVER 
down large birches, the bark of which has a very 
different flavour. These birches, growing as they 
did among the older trees, often presented difficult 
problems. One large one in particular, which had 
a very heavy top of branches, was cut after many 
nights of hard work. Unfortunately it lodged in 
a neighbouring birch and would not fall. Another 
cutting was decided on and continued until the 
twenty-two inches (diameter) had been gnawed 
through. But even this did not accomplish its 
purpose, for, though the trunk shifted a few feet, 
the top remained entangled. The tree against 
which it rested in such an aggravating way was 
nearly as large as the one that had been cut, but 
even that did not daunt the little wood-cutters, 
who went to work with renewed determination to 
cut through its massive trunk. By the third night 
they had cut most of the way through, but the 
trunk, creaking with the great weight of the tree 
which leaned against it, filled the beaver with fear, 
for should it fall there was great danger of being 
caught beneath the mass of branches. So they 
left the task unfinished, perhaps hoping that the 
two trees would fall of their own accord. 
Fortune favoured them, when a few nights later 
a violent storm swept over the country, the roaring 
winds screeched through the forest, snapping off 
branches and uprooting many large trees. The 
winds lashed the water of the lake into a mass of 
foam, threatening even to tear the wood-pile away 
