In the creek that feeds the lake I had fixed up an old beaver-house, placed a quantity of feed, and turned him loose. But he did not want to be loose. Every night before the ice came he was at the camp door at dark. He was by no means the first homeless kitten beaver that had fallen into my hands, and his predecessors, who had all survived their delicate infancy, had seemed imbued with the idea that life was a huge joke, and were mischievous to a degree. But he was all alone and seemed to miss his small companion that was gone, and had none of the light-hearted deviltry of his forerunners. He was a sad little creature as he sat forlornly on the floor, and he had none of the fatal beauty that so undermines the talent of some of our screen heroes, yet who knows but that in the wee old-fashioned brain there was not some dim recollection of happy days of romping and tumbling with just such another clumsy ball of fur, in the deep cool grass along the river-bank? And sometimes, as he regarde d me gravely, sitting on my feet the while, my heart went out to the little waif that did not want to be free, and I would pick him up and pass my hand over the rich fur. And he would sigh contentedly and fall immediately asleep, to dream of cool waters and mud, of poplar leaves and pancakes.