A BIT OF TRAGEDY
Shaggycoat made his way home in a leisurely manner, stopping a day here
and there at some lake or river that pleased his fancy. The home sense
had not yet fully mastered him and he still found pleasure in running
water, and upon grassy fringed banks.
One morning when he had been upon his homeward journey for about a week,
he turned aside to explore a little stream that looked inviting. He
intended to return to the river and resume his journey in a few minutes,
but the unexpected happened and he did not do as he had intended. He was
swimming leisurely in a shallow spot, where the stream was very narrow,
when, without any warning, or premonition of danger, he set his foot in
a trap. The trap had not been baited but merely set at a narrow point in
the stream, in hope that some stray mink or muskrat would blunder into
it. It was nothing that Shaggycoat could blame himself for, but merely
one of those accidents that befall the most wary animals at times.
The trap was rather light for a beaver, but it had caught him just above
the first joint, and held on like a vise. At first Shaggycoat tore about
frantically, churning up the water and roiling the stream, seeking by
mere strength to free himself, but he soon found that this was in vain.
He then tried drowning the trap, but this was equally futile. Next he
buried it in the mud but it always came up after him when he sought to
steal away. Then he waited for a long time and was quiet, thinking it
might let him go of its own accord, but the trap had no such intention.
As the hours wore on, his paw began to swell and pain him, but finally
the pain gave place to numbness, and his whole fore leg began to prickle
and feel queer. With each hour that passed, a wild terror grew upon
Shaggycoat, a terror of he knew not what. The trap gripped him tighter
and tighter, and Brighteyes and the young beavers seemed so far away
that he despaired of ever seeing them again.
Finally the day passed, the sun set, and the stars came out. The hours
of darkness that hold no gloom for a beaver, in which he glories as the
other creatures do in day, were at hand; but they held no joy for poor
Shaggycoat. Every few minutes he would have a spell of wrenching at the
trap, but he was becoming exhausted, although he had thought his
strength inexhaustible. At last a desperate thought came to him. It
seemed the only way out of the difficulty.
He edged the end of the trap where the chain was, between two stones,
then began slowly moving about it in a circle. Occasionally the trap
would come loose, then it would be replaced and the twisting process
renewed. Finally there was a snap, like the crack of a dry twig, and the
bone had been broken. The worst was over. He gnawed away and twisted at
the broken paw until it was severed.
Did it hurt? There was no outcry, only the splashing of the water, and a
bright trail of blood floated down-stream, and the trap sunk to the
bottom to hide the ragged bleeding paw that it still held, while a wiser
and a sadder beaver made his way cautiously back to the main stream,
licking the ragged stump of his fore paw as he went.
The cold water soon stopped the bleeding and helped to reduce the fever,
but Shaggycoat was so spent with the night in the trap that he stopped
to rest for two days before resuming his journey homeward.
Just as the sun peeped over the eastern hills on the morning that
Shaggycoat freed himself from the trap, a boy of some twelve summers
might have been seen hurrying across the fields toward the brook,
closely followed by an old black and tan hound. The boy carried a small
Stevens Rifle known as the hunter's pet, across his arm, and both boy
and dog were excited and eager for the morning's tramp.
In low places where it was moist, the first frost of the season lay
heavy upon the grass, and its delicate lace work was still plainly seen
on stones and by the brookside. It was a fresh crisp morning, just such
a morning as makes one's blood tingle, and whets the appetite.
The birds, as well as the boy, had seen the frost, and the robins were
flocking, though most of the summer songsters had already gone.
About half an hour after Shaggycoat left his ragged paw in the trap and
swam away, leaving a trail of blood behind him, the boy and dog parted
the alder bushes, and came to the spot where the trap had been set.
"By vum, Trixey, something has been in the trap!" exclaimed the boy, as
he noted the muddy water and the tracks upon the bank, but he could not
see whether there was still anything in the trap because of the silt. He
began slowly to haul up the chain, Trixey watching the process eagerly.
At last the end of the chain was reached, and the trap dripping water,
but containing only the ragged paw, came to the surface.
"Why, Trixey, he's gone!" exclaimed the boy. "It wasn't no muskrat,
either. I'll bet it was an otter."
After examining his bloody trophy carefully for a time, the boy reset
the trap, and, wrapping the paw in some fern leaves, took it home to
prove his story, but it was not until several days afterward when he
showed the paw to an old trapper, that he learned that a beaver had been
in his trap.
While Shaggycoat is making his way painfully back to his mountain lake,
occasionally stopping to favor his freshly amputated paw, let us go back
to the lake and see how Brighteyes and the young beavers have been
spending the summer.
For the first few days after Shaggycoat's going, it had seemed very
lonely without him. He had always been so active, coming and going, that
he was greatly missed. But a mother beaver with four lively youngsters
to provide for, has many things to think of, so Brighteyes soon found
that she was kept quite busy attending to the family and providing food,
which had been done before by her mate.
One bright May morning when the air was sweet with the scent of
quickening buds, the winds soft with the breath of spring and a throb
of joy was in each heart; when beast and bird and man were all glad
because the spring had come again, Brighteyes went to the upper end of
the pond for some saplings for the supply of bark was low. She left the
young beavers in the lodge, where they seemed to be quite safe, but the
smell of beaver meat had been tickling the nostrils of the gluttonous
wolverine, and he had lingered about the pond all the spring. The beaver
lodge had been too hard for him to dig through in midwinter, when it was
frozen like a rock, but the sun and winds had drawn the frost from the
walls, and now it was no harder than any other mud house.
It was so pleasant outside where everything was singing and springing to
the light that Brighteyes stayed longer than she intended, and when she
returned and dove into the underground passage, leading to the lodge,
she was surprised to find three of the young beavers in the underground
channel, as close to the water as they could get. They were very much
frightened and did not want to go back into the lodge, so she took them
to one of the underground burrows along the bank, and left them there
while she reconnoitred.
Brighteyes found to her great surprise that a large hole had been dug in
the side of the lodge, and, through the opening, she could see the brown
coat of the wolverine. He was eating something, for she could hear the
crunching of bones. Presently he heard Brighteyes in the passage and
thrust his ugly wolfish head through the hole in the wall. His eye was
evil, and his chops were bloody, and something told the mother beaver
that the blood was that of her missing young one. Then the wolverine
sprang for her through the opening, and she fled precipitately and the
friendly water of the pond enfolded her, where she was safe from the
glutton.
Brighteyes returned to the remaining youngsters, and after that she
guarded them with untiring vigilance. They did not return to the lodge
that summer, but lived in the burrows that Shaggycoat had made along the
bank. When they got tired of living in one, they moved to another. In
this way they were able to shift their base, and still keep the friendly
waters of the pond about them.
Although the glutton lingered about the lake for a week or two, he did
not again taste beaver meat. So one night he slunk away into the woods
in search of some rabbit burrow or fox's hole, from which he might dig
out the luckless victims, and the beavers did not see him again. After
he had been gone for several days, they came out of hiding and had the
freedom of the pond.
When they were large enough, they were taught more of the mysteries of
swimming and diving, at which they would play for an hour at a time. In
fact they never tired of it.
When they had explored the pond and knew all its windings and its many
water recesses, they went upon the bank, but their watchful mother never
allowed them to go far ashore. They early learned that the water world
was the only safe place for them, and there were dangers to be guarded
against even there.
Sometimes, after a swim, they would come upon the bank and sit in the
sun to make their toilet. They would rest upon their flat tails, and
comb their soft fur with the claws upon their hind paws. It was hard to
reach all places upon the body, but they were very patient and combed
away persistently. When they had finished, and the sun had dried their
coats, they were very sleek and glossy.
One starlight night in September, Brighteyes was swimming home from the
upper end of the pond, when she heard a splash in the lake behind her.
She quickened her pace, but her pursuer came steadily nearer. There
seemed to be something familiar in the sound, so she stopped to
investigate. She was now certain of it, so with true female coquetry,
she slipped out upon the bank and hid. A moment later Shaggycoat found
her there, pretending that she did not know all the time it was he.
Her nose was just as warm, and he was just as glad to see her, as he had
been that first night of their tryst. Then the queerest love song that
ever broke the starry stillness floated out across the pond. It was a
mere murmur, like the sighing of autumn winds in leafless branches. This
plaintive love ditty and the weird concert heard in beaver lodges
during the summer months and the signal whistle given when a beaver is
lost are the three vocal accomplishments of the colony.