I often wish that an old beaver neighbor of mine would write the story of his life. Most of the time for eighteen years his mud hut was among the lilies of Lily Lake, Estes Park, Colorado. He lived through many wilderness dangers, escaped the strategy of trappers, and survived the dangerous changes that come in with the home-builder. His life was long, stirring, and adventurous. If, in the first chapter of his life-story, he could record some of the strong, thrilling experiences which his ancestors must have related to him, his book would be all the better.

“Flat-top,” my beaver neighbor, was a pioneer and a colony-founder. It is probable that he was born in a beaver house on Wind River, and it is likely that he spent the first six years of his life along this crag and aspen bordered mountain stream. The first time I saw him he was leading an emigrant party out of this stream’s steep-walled upper course. He and his party settled, or rather resettled, Lily Lake.

Flat-top was the name I gave him because of his straight back. In most beaver the shoulders swell plumply above the back line after the outline of the grizzly bear. Along with this peculiarity, which enabled me to be certain of his presence, was another. This was his habit of gnawing trees off close to the earth when he felled them. The finding of an occasional low-cut stump assured me of his presence during the periods I failed to see him.

The first beaver settlement in the lake appears to have been made in the early seventies, long before Flat-top was born, by a pair of beaver who were full of the pioneer spirit. These settlers apparently were the sole survivors of a large party of emigrants who tried to climb the rugged mountains to the lake, having been driven from their homes by encroaching human settlers. After a long, tedious journey, full of hardships and dangers, they climbed into the lake that was to them, for years, a real promised land.

Driven from Willow Creek, they set off upstream in search of a new home, probably without knowing of Lily Lake, which was five miles distant and two thousand feet up a steep, rocky mountain. These pilgrims had traveled only a little way upstream when they found themselves the greater portion of the time out of water. This was only a brook at its best and in most places it was such a shallow, tiny streamlet that in it they could not dive beyond the reach of enemies or even completely cool themselves. In stretches the water spread thinly over a grassy flat or a smooth granite slope; again it was lost in the gravel; or, murmuring faintly, pursued its way out of sight beneath piles of boulder,—marbles shaped by the Ice King. Much of the time they were compelled to travel upon land exposed to their enemies. Water-holes in which they could escape and rest were long distances apart.

This plodding, perilous five-mile journey which the beaver made up the mountain to the lake would be easy and care-free for an animal with the physical make-up of a bear or a wolf, but with the beaver it is not surprising that only two of the emigrants survived this supreme trial and escaped the numerous dangers of the pilgrimage.

Lily Lake is a shallow, rounded lily garden that reposes in a glacier meadow at an altitude of nine thousand feet; its golden pond-lilies often dance among reflected snowy peaks, while over it the granite crags of Lily Mountain rise several hundred feet. A few low, sedgy, grassy acres border half the shore, while along the remainder are crags, aspen groves, willow-clumps, and scattered pines. Its waters come from springs in its western margin and overflow across a low grassy bar on its curving eastern shore.

It was autumn when these beaver pioneers came to Lily Lake’s primitive and poetic border. The large green leaves of the pond-lily rested upon the water, while from the long green stems had fallen the sculptured petals of gold; the willows were wearing leaves of brown and bronze, and the yellow tremulous robes of the aspens glowed in the golden sunlight.

These fur-clad pioneers made a dugout—a hole in the bank—and busily gathered winter food until stopped by frost and snow; then, almost care-free, they dozed away the windy winter days while the lake was held in waveless ice beneath the drifting snow.

The next summer a house was built in the lily pads near the shore. Here a number of children were born during the few tranquil years that followed. These times came to an end one bright midsummer day. Lord Dunraven had a ditch cut in the outlet rim of the lake with the intention of draining it that his fish ponds, several miles below in his Estes Park game-preserve, might have water. A drouth had prevailed for several months, and a new water-supply must be had or the fish ponds would go dry. The water poured forth through the ditch, and the days of the colony appeared to be numbered.

A beaver must have water for safety and for the ease of movement of himself and his supplies. He is skillful in maintaining a dam and in regulating the water-supply; these two things require much of his time. In Lily Lake the dam and the water question had been so nicely controlled by nature that with these the colonists had had nothing to do. However, they still knew how to build dams, and water-control had not become a lost art. The morning after the completion of the drainage ditch, a man was sent up to the lake to find out why the water was not coming down. A short time after the ditch-diggers had departed, the lowering water had aroused the beaver, who had promptly placed a dam in the mouth of the ditch. The man removed this dam and went down to report. The beaver speedily replaced it. Thrice did the man return and destroy their dam, but thrice did the beaver promptly restore it.

The dam-material used in obstructing the ditch consisted chiefly of the peeled sticks from which the beaver had eaten the bark in winter; along with these were mud and grass. The fourth time that the ditch guard returned, he threw away all the material in the dam and then set some steel traps in the water by the mouth of the ditch. The first two beaver who came to reblockade the ditch were caught in these traps and drowned while struggling to free themselves. Other beaver heroically continued the work that these had begun. The cutting down of saplings and the procuring of new material made their work slow, very slow, in the face of the swiftly escaping water; when the ditch was at last obstructed, a part of the material which formed this new dam consisted of the traps and the dead bodies of the two beaver who had bravely perished while trying to save the colony.

The ditch guard returned with a rifle, and came to stay. The first beaver to come within range was shot. The guard again removed the dam, made a fire about twenty feet from the ditch, and planned to spend the night on guard, rifle in hand. Toward morning he became drowsy, sat down by the fire, heard the air in the pines at his back, watched the star-sown water, and finally fell asleep. While he thus slept, with his rifle across his lap, the beaver placed another—their last—obstruction before the outrushing water.

On awakening, the sleeper tore out the dam and stood guard over the ditch. All that afternoon a number of beaver hovered about, watching for an opportunity to stop the water again. Their opportunity never came, and three who ventured too near the rifleman gave up their lives,—reddening the clear water with their life-blood in vain.

The lake was drained, and the colonists abandoned their homes. One night, a few days after the final attempt to blockade the ditch, an unwilling beaver emigrant party climbed silently out of the uncovered entrance of their house and made their way quietly, slowly, beneath the stars, across the mountain, descending thence to Wind River, where they founded a new colony.

Winter came to the old lake-bed, and the lily roots froze and died. The beaver houses rapidly crumbled, and for a few years the picturesque ruins of the beaver settlement, like many a settlement abandoned by man, stood pathetically in the midst of wilderness desolation. Slowly the water rose to its old level in the lake, as the outlet ditch gradually filled with swelling turf and drifting sticks and trash. Then the lilies came back with rafts of green and boats of gold to enliven this lakelet of repose.

One autumn morning, while returning to my cabin after a night near the stars on Lily Mountain, I paused on a crag to watch the changing morning light down Wind River CaÑon. While thus engaged, Flat-top and a party of colonists came along a game trail within a few yards of me, evidently bound for the lake, which was only a short distance away. I silently followed them. This was my introduction to Flat-top.

On the shore these seven adventurers paused for a moment to behold the scene, or, possibly, to dream of empire; then they waddled out into the water and made a circuit of the lake. Probably Flat-top had been here before as an explorer. Within two hours after their arrival these colonists began building for a permanent settlement.

It was late to begin winter preparation. The clean, white aspens had shed their golden leaves and stood waiting to welcome the snows. This lateness may account for the makeshift of a hut which the colonists constructed. This was built against the bank with only one edge in the water; the entrance to it was a twelve-foot tunnel that ended in the lake-bottom where the water was two feet deep.

The beaver were collecting green aspen and willow cuttings in the water by the tunnel-entrance when the lake froze over. Fortunately for the colonists, with their scanty supply of food, the winter was a short one, and by the first of April they were able to dig the roots of water plants along the shallow shore where the ice had melted. One settler succumbed during the winter, but by summer the others had commenced work on a permanent house, which was completed before harvest time.

I had a few glimpses of the harvest-gathering and occasionally saw Flat-top. One evening, while watching the harvesters, I saw three new workers. Three emigrants—from somewhere—had joined the colonists. A total of fifteen, five of whom were youngsters, went into winter quarters,—a large, comfortable house, a goodly supply of food, and a location off the track of trappers. The cold, white days promised only peace. But an unpreventable catastrophe came before the winter was half over.

One night a high wind began to bombard the ice-bound lake with heavy blasts. The force of these intermittent gales suggested that the wind was trying to dislodge the entire ice covering of the lake; and indeed that very nearly happened.

Before the crisis came, I went to the lake, believing it to be the best place to witness the full effects of this most enthusiastic wind. Across the ice the gale boomed, roaring in the restraining forest beyond. These broken rushes set the ice vibrating and the water rolling and swelling beneath. During one of these blasts the swelling water burst the ice explosively upward in a fractured ridge entirely across the lake. In the next few minutes the entire surface broke up, and the wind began to drive the cakes upon the windward shore.

A large flatboat cake was swept against the beaver house, sheared it off on the water-line, and overturned the conelike top into the lake. The beaver took refuge in the tunnel which ran beneath the lake-bottom. This proved a death-trap, for its shore end above the water-line was clogged with ice. As the lake had swelled and surged beneath the beating of the wind, the water had gushed out and streamed back into the tunnel again and again, until ice formed in and closed the outer entrance. Against this ice four beaver were smothered or drowned. I surmised the tragedy but was helpless to prevent it. Meanwhile the others doubled back and took refuge upon the ruined stump of their home. From a clump of near-by pines I watched this wild drama.

Less than half an hour after the house was wrecked, these indomitable animals began to rebuild it. Lashed by icy waves, beaten by the wind, half-coated with ice, these home-loving people strove to rebuild their home. Mud was brought from the bottom of the pond and piled upon the shattered foundation. This mud set—froze—almost instantly on being placed. They worked desperately, and from time to time I caught sight of Flat-top. Toward evening it appeared possible that the house might be restored, but, just as darkness was falling, a roaring gust struck the lake and a great swell threw the new part into the water.

The colonists gave up the hopeless task and that night fled down the mountain. Two were killed before they had gone a quarter of a mile. Along the trail were three other red smears upon the crusted snow; each told of a death and a feast upon the wintry mountainside among the solemn pines. Flat-top with five others finally gained the Wind River Colony, from which he had led his emigrants two years before.

One day the following June, while examining the lilies in the lake, I came upon a low, freshly cut stump;—Flat-top had returned. A number of colonists were with him and all had come to stay.

All sizable aspen that were within a few yards of the water had been cut away, but at the southwest corner of the lake, about sixty feet from the shore, was an aspen thicket. Flat-top and his fellow workers cut a canal from the lake through a low, sedgy flat into this aspen thicket. The canal was straight, about fourteen inches deep and twenty-six inches wide. Its walls were smoothly cut and most of the excavated material was piled evenly on one side of the canal and about eight inches from it. It had an angular, mechanical appearance, and suggested the work not of a beaver, but of man, and that of a very careful man too.

Down this canal the colonists floated the timbers used in building their two houses. On the completion of the houses, the home-builders returned to the grove and procured winter supplies. In most cases the small aspen were floated to the pile between the houses with an adept skill, without severing the trunk or cutting off a single limb.

The colonists had a few years of ideal beaver life. One summer I came upon Flat-top and a few other beaver by the brook that drains the lake, and at a point about half a mile below its outlet. It was along this brook that Flat-top’s intrepid ancestors had painfully climbed to establish the first settlement in the lake. Commonly each summer several beaver descended the mountain and spent a few weeks of vacation along Wind River. Invariably they returned before the end of August; and autumn harvest-gathering usually began shortly after their return.

Year after year the regularly equipped trappers passed the lake without stopping. The houses did not show distinctly from the trail, and the trappers did not know that there were beaver in this place. But this peaceful, populous lake was not forever to remain immune from the wiles of man, and one day it was planted with that barbaric, cruel torture-machine, the steel trap.

A cultured consumptive, who had returned temporarily to nature, was boarding at a ranch house several miles away. While out riding he discovered the colony and at once resolved to depopulate it. The beaver ignored his array of traps until he enlisted the services of an old trapper, whose skill sent most of the beaver to their death before the sepia-colored catkins appeared upon the aspens. Flat-top escaped.

The ruinous raid of the trappers was followed by a dry season, and during the drouth a rancher down the mountain came up prospecting for water. He cut a ditch in the outlet ridge of the lake, and out gushed the water. He started home in a cheerful mood, but long before he arrived, the “first engineers” had blocked his ditch. During the next few days and nights the rancher made many trips from his house to the lake, and when he was not in the ditch, swearing, and opening it, the beaver were in it shutting off the water.

From time to time I dropped around to see the struggle, one day coming upon the scene while the beaver were completing a blockade. For a time the beaver hesitated; then they partly resumed operations and carried material to the spot, but without showing themselves entirely above water. When it appeared that they must have enough to complete the blockade, I advanced a trifle nearer so as to have a good view while they placed the accumulated material. For a time not a beaver showed himself. By and by an aged one climbed out of the water, pretending not to notice me, and deliberately piled things right and left until he had completed the ditch-damming to his satisfaction. This act was audacious and truly heroic. The hero was Flat-top.

In this contest with the rancher, the beaver persisted and worked so effectively that they at last won and saved their homes, in the face of what appeared to be an unconquerable opposition.

A little while after this incident, a home-seeker came along, and, liking the place, built a cabin in a clump of pines close to the southern shore. Though he was a gray old man without a family, I imagined he would exterminate the beaver and looked upon him with a lack of neighborly feeling.

Several months went by, and I had failed to call upon him, but one day while passing I heard him order a trapper off the place. This order was accompanied by so strong a declaration of principles—together with a humane plea for the life of every wild animal—that I made haste to call that evening.

One afternoon in a pine thicket, close to the lake-shore, I came upon two gray wolves, both devouring beaver, which had met their death while harvesting aspens for winter. The following spring I had a more delightful glimpse of life in the wilds. Within fifty feet of the lake-shore stood a large pine stump that rose about ten feet from the ground. Feeling that I should escape notice if I sat still on the top, I climbed up. Though it was mid-forenoon, the beaver came out of the lake and wandered about nibbling here and there at the few green plants of early spring. They did not detect me. They actually appeared to enjoy themselves. This is the only time that I ever saw a beaver fully at ease and apparently happy on land. In the midst of their pleasures, a flock of mountain sheep came along and mingled with them. The beaver paused and stared; now and then a sheep would momentarily stare at a beaver, or sniff the air as though he did not quite like beaver odor. In less than a minute the flock moved on, but just as they started, a beaver passed in front of the lead ram, who made a playful pretense of a butt at him; to this the beaver paid not the slightest heed.

During the homesteader’s second summer he concluded to raise the outlet ridge, deepen the water, and make a fish pond of the lake. Being poor, he worked alone with wheelbarrow and shovel. The beaver evidently watched the progress of the work, and each morning their fresh footprints showed in the newly piled earth. Shortly before the dam was completed, the homesteader was called away for a few days, and on his return he was astonished to find that the beaver had completed his dam! The part made by the beaver suited him as to height and length, so he covered it over with earth and allowed it to remain. His work in turn was inspected and apparently approved by the beaver.

How long does a beaver live? Trappers say from fifteen to fifty years. I had glimpses of Flat-top through eighteen years, and he must have been not less than four years of age when I first met him. This would make his age twenty-two years; but he may have been six years of age—he looked it—the morning he first led emigrants into Lily Lake; and he may have lived a few years after I saw him last. But only the chosen few among the beaver can succeed in living as long as Flat-top. The last time I saw him was the day he dared me and blockaded the drain ditch and stopped the outrushing water.

Flat-top has vanished, and the kind old homesteader has gone to his last long sleep; but the lake still remains, and still there stands a beaver house among the pond-lilies.