THE BEST BUILDER

Out in the woods rain was pouring down steadily from the black sky. It beat against the leaves and trickled over the trunks of the trees and spattered into the pond. Now and then a flash of lightning glimmered over the water and twinkled in through the hole at the top of the little round house where the beavers lived.

From the outside this house looked like a heap of old brush-wood on a tiny island in the middle of the pond. But inside of it there was a little room, like a cave, with a smooth floor and an arched roof. Along the sides of this room there were five beds of leaves and grass. On one of these beds lay three baby beavers fast asleep in the dark.

The other beds were all empty. The big one at the end belonged to the father beaver. Before the babies were born in May he had gone away for the summer. He had started off with all the other old fathers in the beaver village to have a good time in the woods up the brook. They played and feasted on roots and plants, while the mother beavers stayed home to take care of the babies.

The other three beds belonged to the mother and to her two older children. On this rainy summer night they had gone out to eat their supper under the trees by the pond.

Suddenly the three baby beavers opened their eyes with a start, and rolled off their bed. They had been awakened by the sound of a loud whack on the water outside. It was a noise made by the mother’s flat tail as she dived down toward the door of her house. Her front hall was a tunnel that led from the bottom of the pond to the floor of the dark little room. Through this she went swimming, while the waves bubbled and splashed around her.

When the babies saw her round head poke up through the door in the floor they squeaked and ran to meet her. She was carrying a bundle of small sticks between her chin and her fore-paw. Each little beaver sat up on his hind-legs, with his tail propping him steady from behind. Then he took one of the sticks in his hands and began to nibble the bark with his new yellow teeth.

They were wonderful teeth. After the babies were too old to live on milk, four curved teeth grew out in the front of each little mouth. Two were in the upper jaw and two in the lower jaw. It was the strangest thing! The more these teeth gnawed the sharper they became. The inner side of each tooth was softer than the outer side. In biting together, the inner edge wore down faster, and left the outer edge as sharp as a knife.

The beaver belongs to the Order of Gnawers. Squirrels and rabbits and rats and many other mammals belong to this order. They all have these chisel-shaped front teeth, which keep on growing all their lives long. If any one of them is too lazy to gnaw every day his teeth grow so long that he cannot bite anything at all. Beavers are the largest of the gnawing animals, except the water-hog of South America. They have stronger teeth than any of the others.

Not long after this stormy night the mother beaver decided to take the three babies out with her into the woods. She chose another rainy evening because then their enemies were not likely to be wandering under the dripping trees. Bears and foxes and wild-cats hate to get wet, but beavers enjoy feeling the cool water trickle over their fur and splash on their tails.

Except for their broad, flat tails, the three little beavers looked like rats covered with silky brown fur. The mother seemed like a giant rat, about three feet long from her round nose to the root of her tail. Instead of fur her tail was covered with thick skin. This skin was so creased and dented that it looked like scales.

What an exciting evening it was for the babies! One behind the other they trotted down the dark tunnel after their mother. At first the floor was dry and hard. After a few steps their feet touched something wet. Soft mud oozed between the fingers on their fore-paws. Their hind-feet were webbed up to the toe-nails, and so did not sink in so deep as their fore-paws. Beavers are the only mammals which have webs on one pair of feet, and not on the other pair. They are half land animals and half water animals.

This was not the first time that the three little beavers had ventured into the tunnel. More than once before they had crept down as far as the water and waded about at the edge. But now they kept right on, splashing in farther and farther. The water grew deeper and deeper. In the dark they felt it wash up to their knees, and then up to their chins, and finally away over their backs and their heads to the roof of the tunnel.

Away went the three babies swimming after the old mother. They held their breaths, and shut their ears tight. Their small fore-paws hung down by their sides. They paddled with their webbed hind-feet, and used their broad tails as rudders, to send them now this way, now that.

It seemed the longest time to the last little beaver before his head popped up into the fresh air above the pond. He blinked his light-brown eyes, and winked away the drops on his eyelashes. Now and then a flash of lightning glimmered on the trees around the pond. Of course he did not know yet that his food came from those tall, shadowy things at the edge of the water.

Half-way to the shore a round, dark spot was ploughing through the water, with two ripples spreading out behind it. It was the head of the mother beaver. Behind her followed another head, and then another. The last little beaver swung his tail around and started after them. He puffed and sputtered when a wave washed over his nose. But he did not mind that at all, because this cool water was much pleasanter than the stale air in the warm room at home.

There, under a bush on the bank, he saw his older brother and sister sitting on their tails, while they nibbled the bark from some sticks beside them. When the baby reached his hand toward the pile they grunted and sniffed at him. Just then a flash of lightning gleamed on their long, yellow teeth, and frightened the little fellow so much that he scampered after his mother and the two other babies.

They followed a path into the woods. The father beavers in the village had made it by cutting down trees and bushes and dragging them out of the way. It was a straight path, and more than wide enough for the fattest old beaver. But the last baby was so much afraid of being left behind that he ran without looking on the ground. He stumbled over two low stumps, and bumped into a trunk at one side, before he caught up to the others.

The Beaver.
“Across the pond to feast in the woods.” Page 65.

He saw the mother beaver standing on her hind-legs under a tree. She reached up as high as she could with her mouth and gnawed off a branch. When it fell crackling and rustling she called the three babies to come and learn how to cut their own sticks to eat. She showed them how to set their teeth against the bark, and tear off a chip with a jerk of the head. Another chip and another was gnawed out till the branch was cut in two. The mother could bite through a small stick with one snip of her jaws.

After that, every night all summer long, the three babies followed their mother out through the tunnel and across the pond to feast in the woods. They ate tender grasses and roots as well as bark. Sometimes they went out before dark to romp and play tag in the pond. The biggest little beaver thought that it was the greatest fun to push the others off floating logs. He chased them round and round, splashing water in their faces and making them duck their heads. They enjoyed the fun as much as he did, especially after they all scrambled upon the bank to rest.

On land, the biggest baby was too fat and clumsy to move as fast as the other two. They danced about on their hind-legs, and pretended to step on his tail or pull his fur. It was beautiful fur, so fine and thick and soft that water could not soak through to the skin. The babies did not have a coat of coarse outer hair like the old beavers. When tired of play they sat up and scratched their heads and shoulders with the claws on their hairy fore-paws. Then, after combing their sides with their hind-feet, they curled down in the grass for a nap.

There were plenty of other little low houses in the pond, and in each one lived a family of beavers. The three babies made friends with all the other babies. Together they explored every corner of the pond, from the brook at the upper end to the dam at the lower end.

Very likely the little fellows believed that the dam had always been there. But in fact the old beavers had built it themselves. When they first came to that spot in the woods they found only a brook flowing over a hard, gravelly bottom. They first cut down a bush and floated it along till it stuck fast between a rock and a clump of trees. Next they cut other bushes, and carried down poles and branches, till they had a tangle of brush stretching from one bank to the other. Upon this they piled sticks and stones and mud, and then more sticks and stones and mud, and then still more sticks and stones and mud.

At last the dam was so high and solid that the water could not flow through. So it spread out in a pond above the dam till it was deep enough to trickle over the top and tinkle away in a little brook under the trees.

Tiny islands were left here and there in the pond. The old beavers built their houses on the islands or on the bank. First each mother and father dug two tunnels from the bottom of the pond up through the earth to the floor of their house. One tunnel was to be used when going in and out during the summer. The other tunnel led to their winter pantry under the water. This pantry was to be a pile of fresh sticks cut in the woods every autumn.

Around the two holes in the floor the beavers laid logs and stones in a circle. Upon this foundation they piled sticks and sod to form walls and a roof. Then they plastered the house all over with mud. At the top of the roof they left a small hole, covered only with a tangle of sticks. This was for fresh air. Last of all they swam inside and made the walls even by gnawing off the sharp ends of the wood. Then the house was ready to be furnished with beds of leaves and grasses.

Perhaps during the happy summer the babies believed that play was the most delightful thing in the world. But soon the father beavers came strolling back to the village to cut down trees for the winter. Then the little fellows found that work was even better fun than play.

One night the three babies followed their parents into the woods and watched them cut down a tree. The father stood up on his hind-legs, propping himself with his tail, and began to cut a notch around the trunk. The mother helped on the other side. They gnawed upward and downward, digging out huge chips with their chisel teeth. The circle grew deeper and deeper, till the father’s head was almost hidden whenever he thrust it in to take a fresh bite.

When finally the wood cracked and the tree-top began to sway all the family scampered away to the pond. They dived for the tunnel and hid in the house for a while. There was danger that some hungry wild-cat had heard the crash of the branches and had hurried there to catch them for its supper.

As soon as it seemed safe to do so the beavers paddled out again and trotted away to the fallen tree. The parents trimmed off the branches and cut the trunk into pieces short enough to carry. The father seized a thick pole in his teeth and swung it over his shoulders. As he dragged it toward the pond he kept his head twisted to one side, so that the end of the pole trailed on the ground.

The biggest little beaver tried to drag a smaller branch in the same way. When he rose on his hind-legs, so as to walk along more easily, he forgot to brace himself with his tail. The branch caught on a stone and tipped him backwards, heels over head. The two other babies were rolling a short log by pushing it with their noses. At the sound of their brother’s surprised squeals they gave the log a last wild poke. It seemed to make a jump over a bump, and then tumbled into a hole. There it stayed, though they pushed and pulled and puffed and grunted in trying to get it out again.

It happened that the father beaver reached the pond just in time to help mend the dam with his thick pole. A pointed log had jammed a hole in the dam. The water was beginning to pour through the hole with a rush. If the pond should run dry the doors of the tunnels would be left in plain sight. Then probably a wolf, or some other enemy, would hide there to catch the beavers on their way from the woods to their houses.

The old father pushed his pole into the water; then he jumped in, and, taking hold of it with his teeth, he swam out above the hole. When he let go the water carried the pole squarely across the break in the dam. The other beavers cut bushes and floated them down to weave across the hole. After that they scooped up mud and stones to plaster the dam till not a drop trickled through the mended places.

The next work to be done that autumn was to gather food for the winter. Some of the trees with the juiciest bark grew too far away to be easily dragged to the pond. All the grown-up beavers set to work to dig a canal. They dug and scooped and gnawed off roots, and dragged out stones, till they had made a long canal more than a foot deep. The water flowed into this from the pond. Then it was easy enough to float wood from the juicy trees down to the beaver village.

Even the babies could help in towing the wood down the canal and across the pond to the different houses. Some of the wood became so heavy with soaked-up water that it sank to the bottom beside the doors, and could be packed in a solid pile as easily as on land. Most of the wood, however, kept light enough to float. Instead of heaping new sticks on top, the beavers pushed them under the top branches. Then more was pressed under that, and more under that, till the pile reached to the bottom. In the winter, of course, the top sticks could not be eaten, because they would be frozen fast in the ice.

The autumn days were growing frostier and frostier. After mending the dam and gathering their woodpiles, the beavers plastered a last coat of mud all over the outside of their houses. The mud froze hard and made the little rooms inside as safe as a fort, with walls two feet thick. The babies carried leaves and grasses for their fresh beds. With a bundle tucked between his chin and fore-paw, each one hobbled along on three legs, “working like a beaver,” as the saying is.

One cloudy night, when the beavers were busy out in the woods, something soft and cold began to float down through the chilly air. The biggest baby felt a sting on his nose. When he put out his tongue to lick it he touched only a speck of water. Bits of white sifted on his fur and melted in drops. Presently the ground began to look lighter colored. Something fluttered about his head and settled on his eyelashes. He winked and sneezed and squeaked to the other babies. They had never seen a snowstorm before.

When they jumped into the pond to paddle home something sharp and brittle cracked and snapped in the icy black water. One of the little fellows caught a bit in his mouth. It smarted on his tongue and then it was gone. It was the first time that he had ever tasted ice.

The next night, when the beavers swam to the top of the pond, they bumped their heads against something hard. It cracked all around them. They pushed on, with the water lapping at the jagged edges. After they reached the shore they found it very tiresome to wade through the snow. Before the night was quarter past the old father hurried back to the pond. He was afraid that the ice might freeze too thick for them to break their way home again. He arched his back and slapped his tail on the water with an echoing whack to call the babies after him.

All winter long the beavers lived quietly in their little homes under the snow. Most of the time they slept, each on his own soft bed in the dark. Whenever they were hungry they paddled down the tunnel which led to the woodpile. Gnawing off some sticks they swam back with the bundles under their chins. They used the middle of the room for a dining-table. There they nibbled the bark. Then they carried the peeled sticks back into the pond. They did not like to have rubbish left on the floor.

Sometimes the babies grew restless and tired of staying still in the room. They swam out into the pond and moved about under the ice. They hunted for roots of the yellow water-lily. It must have been hard to hold their breaths long enough to dig up the roots and paddle away back into the house. Once the biggest baby almost had a fight with one of his playmates over a juicy root. They pulled at it so roughly that it was torn to pieces.

So the winter months slipped away. At last spring melted the ice on the pond. Here and there in the black water little brown heads came popping up. They went plowing toward shore, leaving v-shaped ripples stretching out behind. Up the banks scrambled the beavers,—mother beavers and father beavers, big brother beavers and big sister beavers, and all the little beavers who had been babies the year before.

Away roamed the fathers up the brook, to have a good time travelling all summer long. The grown-up brothers and sisters started out to build dams and houses of their own. The little fellows wandered into the woods to find their dinners of tender buds and twigs. The mothers ate the bark from fresh sticks, and then hurried back to carry milk to the new baby beavers, asleep on their soft beds at home.