sedge-thatched dome, of which
something more than three feet now showed itself above the ice.

To the unobservant eye the muskrat house in the alders might have
looked like a mass of drift in which the rank water-grass had taken
root. But within the clumsy pile, about a foot below the centre of the
dome, was a shapely, small, warm chamber, lined with the softest
grasses. From one side of this chamber the burrow slanted down to
another and much larger chamber, the floor of which, at the present
high level of the water, was partly flooded. From this chamber led
downward two burrows,--one, the main passage, by which the muskrat had
entered, opening frankly, as we have seen, in the channel of the
creek, and the other, longer and more devious, terminating in a narrow
and cunningly concealed exit, behind a deeply submerged willow-root.
This passage was little used, and was intended chiefly as a way of
escape in case of an extreme emergency,--such as, for example, the
invasion of a particularly enterprising mink by way of the main
water-gate. The muskrat is no match for the snake-swift, bloodthirsty
mink, except in the one accomplishment of holding his breath under
water. And a mink must be very ravenous, or quite mad with the
blood-lust, to dare the deep water-gate and the long subaqueous
passage to the muskrat's citadel, at seasons of average high water. In
time of drought, however, when the entrance is nearly uncovered and
the water goes but a little way up the dark tunnels, the mink will
often glide in, slaughter the garrison, and occupy the well-built
citadel.

The big muskrat, dragging his lily-root, mounted the narrow, black,
water-filled passage till he reached the first chamber. Here he was
met by his mate, just descending from the upper room. She promptly
appropriated the piece of lily-root, which the big muskrat meekly gave
up. He had fed full before coming, and now had no care except to
clean his draggled fur and make his toilet before mounting to the
little dry top chamber and curling himself up for a nap.

This toilet was as elaborate and painstaking as that of the cleanliest
of cats or squirrels. He was so loose-jointed, so loose-skinned, so
flexibly built in every way, that he could reach every part of his fur
with his teeth and claws at once. He would seem to pull great folds of
skin from his back around under his breast, where he could comb it the
more thoroughly. It was no trouble at all for him to scrat