if there was one thing that tommy enjoyed above another, it was trapping. there were several reasons why he enjoyed it. in the first place, it took him out of doors with something definite to do. he loved the meadows and the woods and the pastures, and all the beauties of them with which old mother nature is so lavish.
he loved to tramp along the laughing brook and around the smiling pool. always, no matter what the time of the year, there was something interesting to see. now it was a flower new to him, or a bird that he had not seen before. again it was a fleeting glimpse of one of the shy, fleet-footed little people who wear coats of fur. he liked these best of all because they were the hardest to surprise and study in their home life. and that was one reason why he enjoyed trapping so much. it was matching his wits against their wits. and one other reason was the money which he got for the pelts.
so tommy was glad when the late fall came and it was time to set traps and every morning make his rounds to see what he had caught. in the coldest part of the winter, when the snow was deep and the ice was thick, he stopped trapping, but he began again with the beginning of spring when the laughing brook was once more set free and the smiling pool no longer locked in icy fetters.[62] it was then that the muskrats and the minks became most active, and their fur coats were still at their best. you see the more active they were, the more likely they were to step into one of his traps.
on this particular afternoon, after school, tommy had come down to the smiling pool to set a few extra traps for muskrats. the trapping season, that is the season when the fur was still at its best, or “prime,” as the fur dealers call it, would soon be at an end. he had set a trap on an old log which lay partly in and partly out of the water. he knew that the muskrats used this old log to sun themselves because one had plunged off it as he came up. so he set a trap just under water on the end of the old log where the first muskrat who tried to climb out there would step in it.
“i’ll get one here, as sure as shooting,” said tommy.
then he found a little grassy tussock, and he knew by the matted-down grass that it was a favorite resting place for muskrats. here he set another trap and left some slices of carrot as bait.
by the merest accident, he found a hole in the bank and, from the look of it, he felt sure that it had been made by one of the furry little animals he wanted to catch. right at the very entrance he set another trap, and artfully covered it with water-soaked leaves from the bottom of the smiling pool so that it could not be seen.
“i’d like to see anything go in or out of that hole without getting caught,” said he, with an air of being mightily tickled with himself and his own smartness.
so he went on until he had set all his traps, and all the time he was very happy. spring had come, and it is everybody’s right to be happy in the spring. he heard the joyous notes of the first birds who had come on the lagging heels of winter from the warm southland, and they made him want to sing, himself. everything about him proclaimed new life and the joy of living. he could feel it in the very air. it was good to be alive.
after the last trap had been put in place, he sat down on an old log to rest for a few minutes and enjoy the scene. the smiling pool was as smooth as polished glass. presently, as tommy sat there without moving, two little silver lines, which met and formed a v, started on the farther side of the smiling pool and came straight toward him. tommy knew what those silver lines were. they were the wake made by a swimming muskrat.
“my! i wish i’d brought my gun!” thought tommy. “it’s queer how a fellow always sees things when he hasn’t a gun, and never sees them when he has.”
he could perceive the little brown head very plainly now, and, as it drew nearer, he could distinguish the outline of the body just under the surface, and back of that the queer, rubbery, flattened tail set edge-wise in the water and moving rapidly from side to side.
“it’s a regular propeller,” thought tommy, “and he certainly knows how[66] to use it. it sculls him right along. if he should lose that, he sure would be up against it!”
tommy moved ever so little, so as to get a better view. instantly there was a sharp slap of the tail on the water, a plunge, and only a ripple to show that a second before there had been a swimmer there. two other slaps and plunges sounded from distant parts of the smiling pool and tommy knew that he would see no more muskrats unless he sat very still for a long time. slowly he got to his feet, stretched, and then started for home. all the way across the green meadows he kept thinking of that little glimpse of muskrat life he had had, and for the first time in his life he began to think that there might be something more interesting about a[67] muskrat than his fur coat. always before, he had thought of a muskrat as simply a rat, a big, overgrown cousin of the pests that stole the grain in the hen-house, and against whom every man’s hand is turned, as it should be.
but somehow that little glimpse of jerry muskrat at home had awakened a new interest. it struck him quite suddenly that it was a very wonderful thing that an animal breathing air, just as he did himself, could be so at home in the water and disappear so suddenly and completely.
“it must be fine to be able to swim like that!” thought tommy as he sat down on the wishing-stone, and looked back across the green meadows to the smiling pool. “i wonder what he does down there under water. now i think[68] of it, i don’t know much about him except that he is the only rat with a fur that is good for anything. if it wasn’t for that fur coat of his, i don’t suppose anybody would bother him. what a snap he would have then! i guess he has no end of fun in the summer, with nothing to worry about and plenty to eat, and always cool and comfortable no matter what the weather!
“what gets me is how he spends the winter when everything is frozen. he must be under the ice for weeks. i wonder if he sleeps the way the woodchuck does. i suppose i can find out just by wishing, seeing that i’m sitting right here on the old wishing-stone. it would be a funny thing to do to wish myself into a rat. it doesn’t seem as if there could be anything very interesting about[69] the life of anything so stupid-looking as a muskrat, and yet i’ve thought the same thing about some other creatures and found i was wrong.”
he gazed dreamily down toward the smiling pool, and, the longer he looked, the more he wondered what it would be like to live there. at last, almost without knowing it, he said the magic words.
“i—i wish i were a muskrat!” he murmured.
tommy was in the smiling pool. he was little and fur-coated, with a funny little flattened tail. and he really had two coats, the outer of long hairs, a sort of water-proof, while the under coat was soft and fine and meant to keep him warm. and, though he was swimming with only his head out of water, he wasn’t wet at all.
it was a beautiful summer evening, just at the hour of twilight, and the smiling pool was very beautiful, the most beautiful place that ever was. at least it seemed so to tommy. in the bulrushes a few little feathered folks were still twittering sleepily. over on his big green lily-pad grandfather frog was leading the frog chorus in a great deep voice. from various places in the smiling pool came sharp little squeaks and faint splashes. it was playtime for little muskrats and visiting time for big muskrats.
an odor of musk filled the air and was very pleasant to tommy as he sniffed and sniffed. he was playing hide-and-seek and tag with other little muskrats of his own age, and not one of them had a care in all the world. far away,[71] hooty the owl was sending forth his fierce hunting call, but no one in the smiling pool took the least notice of it. by and by it ceased.
tommy was chasing one of his playmates in and out among the bulrushes. twice they had been warned by a wise old muskrat not to go beyond the line of bulrushes into the open water. but little folks are forgetful, especially when playing. tommy’s little playmate forgot. in the excitement of getting away from tommy he swam out where the first little star was reflected in the smiling pool. a shadow passed over tommy and hardly had it passed when there was a sharp slap of something striking the water.
tommy knew what it was. he knew that it was the tail of some watchful old[72] muskrat who had discovered danger, and that it meant “dive at once.” tommy dived. he didn’t wait to learn what the danger was, but promptly filled his little lungs with air, plunged under water and swam as far as he could. when he just had to come up for more air, he put only his nose out and this in the darkest place he knew of among the rushes.
there he remained perfectly still. down inside, his heart was thumping with fear of he knew not what. there wasn’t a sound to be heard around the smiling pool. it was as still as if there was no living thing there. after what seemed like a long, long time, the deep voice of grandfather frog boomed out, and then the squeak of the old muskrat who had given the alarm told all within hearing that all was safe again. at once, all fear left tommy and he swam to find his playmates.
“what was it?” he asked one of them.
“hooty, the owl,” was the reply. “didn’t you see him?”
“i saw a shadow,” replied tommy.
“that was hooty. i wonder if he caught anybody,” returned the other.
tommy didn’t say anything, but he thought of the playmate who forgot and swam out beyond the bulrushes, and, when he had hunted and hunted and couldn’t find him, he knew that hooty had not visited the smiling pool for nothing.
so tommy learned the great lesson of never being careless and forgetting. later that same night, as he sat on a little muddy platform on the edge of the[74] water eating a delicious tender young lily-root, there came that same warning slap of a tail on the water. tommy didn’t wait for even one more nibble, but plunged into the deepest water and hid as before. this time when the signal that all was well was given he learned that some one with sharper ears than his had heard the footsteps of a fox on the shore and had given the warning just in the nick of time.
four things tommy learned that night. first, that, safe and beautiful as it seems, the smiling pool is not free from dangers for little muskrats; second, that forgetfulness means a short life; third, that to dive at the instant a danger-signal is sounded and inquire later what the danger was is the only sure way of being safe; and fourth, that it is the duty of every muskrat who detects danger to warn every other muskrat.
though he didn’t realize it then, this last was the most important lesson of all. it was the great lesson that human beings have been so long learning, and which many have not learned yet, that, just in proportion as each one looks out for the welfare of his neighbors, he is himself better off. instead of having just one pair of little eyes and one pair of keen little ears to guard him against danger tommy had many pairs of little eyes and little ears keeping guard all the time, some of them better than his own.
eating, sleeping, and playing, and of course watching out for danger, were all that tommy had to think about through the long lazy summer, and he grew and grew and grew until he was as big as the biggest muskrats in the smiling pool, and could come and go as he pleased.
there was less to fear now from hooty the owl, for hooty prefers tender young muskrats. he had learned all about the ways of reddy fox, and feared him not at all. he had learned where the best lily-roots grow, and how to find and open mussels, those clams which live in fresh water. he had a favorite old log, half in the water, to which he brought these to open them and eat them, and more than one fight did he have before his neighbors learned to respect this as his. he had explored all the shore of the smiling pool and knew every hole in the banks. he had even been some distance up the laughing[77] brook. life was very joyous.
but, as summer began to wane, the days to grow shorter and the nights longer, he discovered that playtime was over. at least, all his friends and neighbors seemed to think so, for they were very, very busy. something inside told him that it was time, high time, that he also went to work. cold weather was coming and he must be prepared. for one thing he must have a comfortable home, and the only way to get one was to make one for himself.
of course this meant work, but somehow tommy felt that he would feel happier if he did work. he was tired of doing nothing in particular. in his roamings about, he had seen many muskrat homes, some of them old and deserted, and some of them visited while the[78] owners were away. he knew just what a first-class house should be like. it should be high enough in the bank to be above water at all times, even during the spring floods, and it should be reached by a passage the entrance to which should at all times be under water, even in the driest season.
on the bank of the smiling pool grew a tree, and the spreading roots came down so that some of them were in the smiling pool itself. under them, tommy made the entrance to his burrow. the roots hid it. at first the digging was easy, for the earth was little more than mud; but, as the passage slanted up, the digging became harder. still he kept at it. two or three times he stopped and decided that he had gone far enough, then changed his mind and[79] kept on. at last he found a place to suit him, and there he made a snug chamber not very far under the grass-roots.
when he had finished it, he was very proud of it. he told jerry muskrat about it. “have you more than one entrance to it?” asked jerry.
“no,” replied tommy, “it was hard enough work to make that one.”
jerry turned up his nose. “that wouldn’t do for me,” he declared. “a house with only one entrance is nothing but a trap. supposing a fierce old mink should find that doorway while you were inside; what would you do then?”
tommy hadn’t thought of that. once more he went to work, and made another long tunnel leading up to that snug chamber; and then, perhaps because he had got the habit, he made a[80] third. from one of these tunnels he even made a short branch with a carefully hidden opening right out on the meadow, for tommy liked to prowl around on land once in a while. the chamber he lined with grass and old rushes until he had a very comfortable bed.
with all this hard work completed, you would have supposed that tommy would have been satisfied, wouldn’t you? but he wasn’t. he found that some of his neighbors were building houses of a wholly different kind, and right away he decided that he must have one too. so he chose a place where the water was shallow, and not too far from the place where the water-lilies grew; and there among the bulrushes he once more set to work.
this time he dug out the mud and the roots of the rushes, piling them around him until he was in a sort of little well. from this he dug several tunnels leading to the deep water where he could be sure that the entrance never would be frozen over. the mud and sods he piled up until they came above the water, and then he made a platform of rushes and mud with an opening in the middle down into that well from which his tunnels led. on this platform he built a great mound of rushes, and grass, and even twigs, all wattled together. some of them he had to bring clear from the other side of the smiling pool.
and, as he built that mound, he made a nice large room in the middle, biting off all the ends of sticks and rushes which happened to be in the way. when he had made that room to suit him, he made a comfortable bed there, just as he had in the house in the bank. then he built the walls very thick, adding rushes and mud and sods all around except on the very top. there he left the roof thinner, with little spaces for the air to get in, for of course he must have fresh air to breathe.
when at last the new house was finished, he was very proud of it. there were two rooms, the upper one with its comfortable bed quite above the water, and the lower one wholly under water, connected with the former by a little doorway. the only way of getting into the house was by one of his tunnels to the lower room. when all was done, an old muskrat looked it over and told[83] him that he had done very well for a young fellow, which made tommy feel very important.
the weather was growing cool now, so tommy laid up some supplies in both houses and then spent his spare time calling on his neighbors. by this time he had grown a fine thick coat and didn’t mind at all how cold it grew. in fact he liked the cold weather.
it was about this time that he had a dreadful experience. he climbed out one evening on his favorite log to open and eat a mussel he had found. there was a snap, and something caught him by the tail and pinched dreadfully. he pulled with all his might, but the dreadful thing wouldn’t let go. he turned and bit at it, but it was harder than his[84] teeth and gnaw as he would he could make no impression on it.
a great terror filled his heart and he struggled and pulled, heedless of the pain, until he was too tired to struggle longer. he just had to lie still. after a while, when he had regained his strength, he struggled again. this time he felt his tail give a little. a neighbor swam over to see what all the fuss was about.
“it’s a trap,” said he. “it’s lucky you are not caught by a foot instead of by the tail. if you keep on pulling you may get free. i did once.”
this gave tommy new hope and he struggled harder than ever. at last he fell headlong into the water. the cruel steel jaws had not been able to keep his tapered tail from slipping between[85] them. he was free, but oh, so frightened!
after that tommy grew wise. he never went ashore without first examining the place for one of those dreadful traps, and he found more than one. it got so that he gave up all his favorite places and made new ones. once he found one of his friends caught by a forefoot and he was actually cutting his foot off with his sharp teeth. it was dreadful, but it was the only way of saving his life.
those were sad and terrible times around the smiling pool and along the laughing brook for the people in fur, but there didn’t seem to be anything they could do about it except to everlastingly watch out.
one morning tommy awoke to find the smiling pool covered with ice. he liked it. a sense of great peace fell on the smiling pool. there was no more danger from traps except around certain spring holes, and there was no need of going there. much of the time tommy slept in that fine house of rushes and mud. its walls had frozen solid and it was as comfortable as could be imagined. a couple of friends who had no house stayed with him.
when they were hungry all they had to do was to drop down into the tunnel leading to deep water and so out into the smiling pool under the ice, dig up a lily-root and swim back and eat it in comfort inside the house. if they got short of air while swimming under the ice they were almost sure to find little air spaces under the edge of the banks.[87] no matter how bitter the cold or how wild the storm above the ice,—below it was always calm and the temperature never changed.
sometimes tommy went over to his house in the bank. once, while he was there, a bloodthirsty mink followed him. tommy heard him coming and escaped down one of the other passages. then he was thankful indeed that he had made more than one. but this was his only adventure all the long winter. at last spring came, the ice disappeared and the water rose in the laughing brook until it was above the banks, and in the smiling pool until tommy’s house was nearly under water. then he moved over to his house in the bank and was comfortable again.
one day he swam over to his house of rushes and climbed up on the top. he had no thought of danger there and he was heedless. snap! a trap set right on top of the house held him fast by one leg. a mist swam before his eyes as he looked across the green meadows and heard the joyous carol of welcome robin. why, oh why, should there be such misery in the midst of so much joy? he was trying to make up his mind to lose his foot when, far up on the edge of the meadows, he saw an old gray rock. somehow the sight of it brought a vague sense of comfort to him. he strained his eyes to see it better and—tommy was just himself, rubbing his eyes as he sat on the old wishing-stone.
“—i was just going to cut my foot off. ugh!” he shuddered. “two or[89] three times i’ve found a foot in my traps, but i never realized before what it really meant. why, those little chaps had more nerve than i’ll ever have!”
he gazed thoughtfully down toward the smiling pool. then suddenly he sprang to his feet and began to run toward it. “it’s too late to take all of ’em up to-night,” he muttered, “but i’ll take what i can, and to-morrow morning i’ll take up the rest. i hope nothing will get caught in ’em. i never knew before how dreadful it must be to be caught in a trap. i’ll never set another trap as long as i live, so there!
“why, jerry muskrat is almost as wonderful as paddy the beaver, and he doesn’t do anything a bit of harm. i didn’t know he was so interesting. he hasn’t as many troubles as some, but he has enough, i guess, without me adding to them. say, that’s a great life he leads! if it wasn’t for traps, it wouldn’t be half bad to be a muskrat. of course it’s better to be a boy, but i can tell you right now i’m going to be a better boy—less thoughtless and cruel. jerry muskrat, you haven’t anything more to fear from me, not a thing! i take off my hat to you for a busy little worker, and for having more nerve than any boy i know.”
and never again did tommy set a trap for little wild folk.
