Boy
noted that the region was one of numberless small brooks flowing
through a comparatively level land, with old, long-deserted
beaver-meadows interspersed among wooded knolls. Yet for a time there
were no signs of the actual living beavers. He asked the reason, and
Jabe said:

"It's been all trapped over an' over, years back, when beaver
pelts was high,--an' by Injuns, likely, who just cleaned out
everythin',--an' broke down the dams,--an' dug out the houses. But
the little critters is comin' back. Furder up the valley there's some
good ponds now!"

"And now they'll be cleaned out again!" exclaimed the Boy, with a rush
of indignant pity.

"Not on yer life!" answered Jabe. "We don't do things that way now. We
don't play low-down tricks on 'em an' clean out a whole family, but
jest take so many out of each beaver house, an' then leave 'em alone
two er three years to kinder recooperate!"

As Jabe finished they came in sight of a long, rather low dam, with a
pond spread out beyond it that was almost worthy to be called a lake.
It was of comparatively recent creation, as the Boy's observant eye
decided at once from the dead trees still rising here and there from
the water.

"Gee!" he exclaimed, under his breath. "That's a great pond, Jabe!"

"There's no less'n four beaver houses in that pond!" said the
woodsman, with an air of proud possession. "That makes, accordin' to
my reckonin', anywheres from thirty to thirty-six beaver. Bye and bye,
when the time comes, I'll kinder thin 'em out a bit, that's all!"

From the crest of the dam all four houses--one far out and three close
to shore--were visible to the Boy's initiated eye; though strangers
might have taken them to be mere casual accumulations of sticks
deposited by some whimsical freshet. It troubled him to think how many
of the architects of these cunningly devised dwellings would soon have
to yield up their harmless and interesting lives; but he felt no
mission to attempt a reform of humanity's taste for furs, so he did
not allow himself to become sentimental on the subject. Beavers, like
men, must take fate as it comes; and he turned an attentive ear to
Jabe's lesson.

"Ye know, of course," said the woodsman, "the steel trap we use. We
ain't got no use fer the tricks of the Injuns, though I'm goin' to
tell ye all _them_, in good time. An' we ain't much on new-fangled
notions, neether. But the old, smooth-jawed steel-trap, what kin
_hold_ when it gits a gri