The Adventures of Paddy the Beaver | Page 2

the Green Forest, around the edge of which grew many young
aspen-trees, the bark of which is his favorite food. Through the middle
of this open place flowed the Laughing Brook. At the lower edge was
just the place for a dam. It would not have to be very long, and when it
was finished and the water was stopped in the Laughing Brook, it
would just have to flow over the low open place and make a pond there.
Paddy's eyes twinkled when he first saw it. It was right then that he
made up his mind to stay in the Green Forest.
So now that he was ready to begin his dam he went up the Laughing
Brook to a place where alders and willows grew, and there he began
work; that work was the cutting of a great number of trees by means of
his big front teeth which were given him for just this purpose. And as
he worked, Paddy was happy, for one can never be truly happy who
does no work.

II
PADDY PLANS A POND
Paddy the Beaver was busy cutting down trees for the dam he had
planned to build. Up in the woods of the North from which he had
come to the Green Forest he had learned all about tree-cutting and
dam-building and canal-digging and house-building. Paddy's father and
mother had been very wise in the ways of the Beaver world, and Paddy
had been quick to learn. So now he knew just what to do and the best
way of doing it. You know a great many people waste time and labor
doing things the wrong way, so that they have to be done over again.
They forget to be sure they are right, and so they go ahead until they
find they are wrong, and all their work goes for nothing.
But Paddy the Beaver isn't this kind. Paddy would never have leaped
into the spring with the steep sides without looking, as Grandfather
Frog did. So now he carefully picked out the trees to cut. He could not
afford to waste time cutting down a tree that wasn't going to be just
what he wanted when it was down. When he was sure that the tree was

right, he looked up at the top to find out whether, when he had cut it, it
would fall clear of other trees. He had learned to do that when he was
quite young and heedless. He remembered just how he had felt when
after working hard, oh, so hard, to cut a big tree, he had warned all his
friends to get out of the way so that they would not be hurt when it fell,
and then it hadn't fallen at all because the top had caught in another tree.
He was so mortified that he didn't get over it for a long time.
So now he made sure that a tree was going to fall clear and just where
he wanted it. Then he sat up on his hind legs, and with his great broad
tail for a brace, began to make the chips fly. You know Paddy has the
most wonderful teeth for cutting. They are long and broad and sharp.
He would begin by making a deep bite, and then another just a little
way below. Then he would pry out the little piece of wood between.
When he had cut very deep on one side so that the tree would fall that
way, he would work around to the other side. Just as soon as the tree
began to lean and he was sure that it was going to fall, he would
scamper away so as to be out of danger. He loved to see those tall trees
lean forward slowly, then faster and faster, till they struck the ground
with a crash.
Just as soon as they were down, he would trim off the branches until
the trees were just long poles. This was easy work, for he could take off
a good-sized branch with one bite. On many he left their bushy tops.
When he had trimmed them to suit him and had cut them into the right
lengths, he would tug and pull them down to the place where he meant
to build his dam.
There he placed the poles side by side, not across the Laughing Brook
like a bridge, but with the big ends pointing up the Laughing Brook,
which was quite broad but shallow right there. To keep them from
floating away, he rolled stones and piled mud on the bushy ends. Clear
across on both sides he laid those poles until the land began to rise.
Then he dragged more poles and piled on top of these