University Missourian. [volume] (Columbia, Mo.) 1908-1916, 1915-09-03
CHAPTER XIX
The Usurpers

1t was that glorious season between
spring and summer, when the north
ern nights were brilliant with moon
and stars, that Kazan and Gray Wolf
set up the valley between the two
ridges on long hunt. 1t was the be-
ginning of that wanderlust which al
ways comes to the furred and padded
creatures of the wilderness immedi-
ately after the yOung-born of early
spring have left their mothers to find
their own way in the big world They
struck west from their winter home
under the windfall in the swamp. They
hunted mostly at night and behind
them they left trail marked by the
partly eaten carcasses of rabbits and
partridges.. 1t was the season of
slaughter and not Of hunger. Ten
miles west of the swamp they killed a
fawn. This, too. they left after a sin
gle meal. Their appetites became
satiated with warm flesh and blood.
They grew sleek and fat and each day
they basked longer in the warm sun
shine. They had few rivals. The
lynxes were in the heavier timber to
the south. There were no wolves.
Fisher-cat, marten and mink were nu-
merous along the creek, but these
were neither swift-hunting nor long
fanged. One day they came upon an
old otter. He was giant of his kind,
turning whitish gray with the ap-
proach of summer. Kazan, grown fat
and lazy, watched him idly. Blind
Gray Wolf shifted at the fishy smell of
him in the air. To them he was no
more than floating stick, creature
out of their element, along with the
fish, and they continued on their way
not knowing that this uncanny crea-
ture with the cOal-like flappers was
soon to become their ally in one of the
strange and deadly feuds of the will
derness, which are as sanguinary to
animal life as the deadliest feuds of
men are to human life.
The day following their meeting with
the otter Gray Wolf and Kazan con-
tinued three miles farther westward,
still following the stream. Here they
encountered the interruption to their
progress which turned them over the
northward ridge. The obstacle was
huge beaver dam. The dam was two
hundred yards in width and flooded
mile of swamp and timber above it.
Neither Gray Wolf nor. Kazan was
deeply interested in beavers. They
also moved out of their element, along
with the fish and the otter and swift
winged birds.
So they turned into the north, not
knowing that nature had already
schemed that they four-the dog, otter
and beaver-should soon be engaged
in one of those merciless struggles of
the wild which keep animal life down
to the survival of the fittest, and whose
tragic histories are kept secret under
the stars and the moon and the winds
that tell no tales.
For many years no man had come
into this valley between the two ridges
to molest the beaver. If a Sarcee trap
per had followed down the nameless
creek and had caught the patriarch
and chief of the colony, he would at
once have judged him to be very old
and his Indian tongue would have CIV
en- him name. He would have called
him Broken Tooth, because one of
the four long teeth with which he
felled trees and built dams was broken
off Six years before Broken Tooth
had led a few beavers of his own age
down the stream, and they had built
their first small dam and their first
lodge. The following April Broken
Tooth's mate had four little baby bea-
vers, and each of the other mothers in
the colony increased the population
by two or three or four. At the end
of the fourth year this first generation
of children, had they followed the
usual law of nature, would have mated
and left the colony to build dam and
lodges of their own. They mated, but
did not emigrate.
The next year the second genera
ton of children, now four years old,
mated but did not leave, so that in this
early summer of the sixth year the
colony was very much like great city
that had been long besieged by an
enemy. 1t numbered fifteen lodges
and over a hundred beavers, not
counting the four babies which had
been born during March and April
The dam had been heightened until 1t
was fully two hundred yards in length
Water had been made to food large
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