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19 - Kazan by James Oliver Curwood · Kazan

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  Speaker 1: Chapter nineteen, The Usurpers. It was that glorious season between
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  Speaker 1: spring and summer, when the northern nights were brilliant with
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  Speaker 1: moon and stars, that Kazan and gray Wolf set up
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  Speaker 1: the valley between the two ridges on a long hunt.
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  Speaker 1: It was the beginning of that wonderlust which always comes
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  Speaker 1: to the furred and padded creatures of the wilderness. Immediately
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  Speaker 1: after the young born of early spring have left their
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  Speaker 1: mothers to find their own way in the big world.
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  Speaker 1: They struck west from their winter home under the windfall
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  Speaker 1: in the swamp, they hunted mostly at night, and behind
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  Speaker 1: them they left a trail marked by the partly eaten
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  Speaker 1: carcasses of rabbits and partridges. It was the season of
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  Speaker 1: slaughter and not of hunger. Ten miles west of the
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  Speaker 1: swamp they killed a fawn. This too, they left after
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  Speaker 1: a single meal. Their appetites became sat shaded with warm
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  Speaker 1: flesh and blood. They grew sleek and fat, and each
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  Speaker 1: day they basked longer in the warm sunshine. They had
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  Speaker 1: few rivals. The lynxes were in the heavier timber to
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  Speaker 1: the south. There were no wolves. Fisher, cat, marten and
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  Speaker 1: mink were numerous along the creek, but these were neither
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  Speaker 1: swept hunting nor long fanged. One day they came upon
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  Speaker 1: an old otter. He was a giant of his kind,
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  Speaker 1: turning a whitish gray with the approach of summer. Kazan,
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  Speaker 1: grown fat and lazy, watched him idly. Blind gray Wolf
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  Speaker 1: sniffed at the fishy smell of him in the air.
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  Speaker 1: To them, he was no more than a floating stick,
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  Speaker 1: a creature out of their element along with the fish,
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  Speaker 1: and they continued on their way, not knowing that this
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  Speaker 1: uncanny creature with the coal like flappers was soon to
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  Speaker 1: become their ally in one of the strange and deadly
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  Speaker 1: feuds of the wilderness, which are as sanguinary to animal
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  Speaker 1: life as the deadliest feuds of men are to human life.
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  Speaker 1: The day following their meeting with the otter, gray Wolf
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  Speaker 1: and Kazan continued three miles farther westward, still following the stream.
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  Speaker 1: Here they encountered the interruption to their progress, which turned
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  Speaker 1: them over the northward ridge. The obstacle was a huge
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  Speaker 1: beaver dam. The dam was two hundred yards in width
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  Speaker 1: and flooded a mile of swamp and timber above it.
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  Speaker 1: Neither gray Wolf nor Kazan was deeply interested in beavers.
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  Speaker 1: They also moved out of their element, along with the
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  Speaker 1: fish and the otter and swift winged birds. So they
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  Speaker 1: turned into the north, not knowing that nature had already
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  Speaker 1: schemed that they four, the dog, wolf, otter and beaver
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  Speaker 1: should soon be engaged in one of those merciless struggles
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  Speaker 1: of the wild, which keep animal life down to the
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  Speaker 1: survival of the fittest, and whose tragic histories are kept
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  Speaker 1: secret under the stars and the moon and the winds
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  Speaker 1: that tell no tales. For many years, no man had
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  Speaker 1: come into this valley between the two ridges to molest
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  Speaker 1: the beaver. If a Sarcee trapper had followed down the
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  Speaker 1: nameless creek and had caught the patriarch and chief of
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  Speaker 1: the colony, he would at once have judged him to
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  Speaker 1: be very old, and his Indian tongue would have given
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  Speaker 1: him a name. He would have called him Broken Tooth,
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  Speaker 1: because one of the four long teeth with which he
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  Speaker 1: felled trees and built dams was broken off. Six years before,
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  Speaker 1: Broken Tooth had let a few beavers of his own
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  Speaker 1: age down the stream, and they had built their first
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  Speaker 1: small dam and their first lodge. The following April, Broken
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  Speaker 1: Tooth's mate had four little baby beavers, and each of
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  Speaker 1: the other mothers in the colony increased the population by
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  Speaker 1: two or three or four. At the end of the
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  Speaker 1: fourth year, this first generation of children, had they followed
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  Speaker 1: the usual law of nature, would have mated and left
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  Speaker 1: the colony to build a dam and lodges of their own.
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  Speaker 1: They mated but did not emigrate. The next year, the
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  Speaker 1: second generation of children, now four years old, mated but
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  Speaker 1: did not leave, so that in this early summer of
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  Speaker 1: the sixth year, the colony was very much like a
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  Speaker 1: great city that had been long besieged by an enemy.
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  Speaker 1: It numbered fifteen lodges and over a hundred beavers, not
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  Speaker 1: counting the fourth babies which had been born during March
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  Speaker 1: and April. The dam had been lengthened until it was
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  Speaker 1: fully two hundred yards in length. Water had been made
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  Speaker 1: to flood large areas of birch and poplar, and tangled
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  Speaker 1: swamps of tender willow and elder. Even with this, food
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  Speaker 1: was growing scarce, and the lodges were overcrowded. This was
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  Speaker 1: because beavers are almost human in their love for home.
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  Speaker 1: Broken Tooth's lodge was fully nine feet long by seven
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  Speaker 1: wide inside, and there were now living in it children
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  Speaker 1: and grandchildren to the number of twenty seven. For this reason,
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  Speaker 1: Broken Tooth was preparing to break the precedent of his tribe.
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  Speaker 1: When Kazan and Gray Wolf sniffed carelessly at the strong
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  Speaker 1: sense of the beaver city, Broken Tooth was marshaling his
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  Speaker 1: family and two of his sons and their families for
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  Speaker 1: the exodus. As yet, Broken Tooth was the recognized leader
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  Speaker 1: in the colony. No other beaver had grown to his
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  Speaker 1: size and strength. His thick body was fully three feet long,
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  Speaker 1: he weighed at least sixty pounds. His tail was fourteen
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  Speaker 1: inches in length and five in width, and on a
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  Speaker 1: still night, he could strike the water a blow that
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  Speaker 1: could be heard a quarter of a mile away. His
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  Speaker 1: webbed hind feet were twice as large as his mates,
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  Speaker 1: and he was easily the swiftest swimmer in the colony.
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  Speaker 1: Following the afternoon, when Gray Wolfe and Kazan struck into
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  Speaker 1: the north, came the clear, still night when Broken Tooth
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  Speaker 1: climbed to the top of the dam, shook himself and
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  Speaker 1: looked down to see that his army was behind him.
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  Speaker 1: The starlit water of the big pond rippled and flashed
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  Speaker 1: with the movement of many bodies. A few of the
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  Speaker 1: older beavers clambered up after Broken Tooth, and the old
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  Speaker 1: patriarch plunged down into the narrow stream on the other
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  Speaker 1: side of the dam. Now the shining, silken bodies of
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  Speaker 1: the emigrants followed him in the starlight. In ones and
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  Speaker 1: twos and threes, they climbed over the dam, and with
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  Speaker 1: them went a dozen children born three months before. Easily
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  Speaker 1: and swiftly they began the journey downstream, the impsters swimming
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  Speaker 1: furiously to keep up with their parents. In all they
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  Speaker 1: numbered forty. Broken Tooth swam well in the lead, with
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  Speaker 1: his older workers and battlers behind him. In the rear,
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  Speaker 1: followed mothers and children. All of that night the journey continued.
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  Speaker 1: The Otter, their deadliest enemy, deadlier even than man, hid
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  Speaker 1: himself in a thick clump of willows as they passed. Nature,
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  Speaker 1: which sometimes seized beyond the vision of man, had made
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  Speaker 1: him the enemy of these creatures that were passing his
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  Speaker 1: hiding place in the night. A fish feeder, he was
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  Speaker 1: born to be a conserver as well as a destroyer,
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  Speaker 1: of the creatures on which he fed. Perhaps Nature told
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  Speaker 1: him that too many beaver dams stopped the run of
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  Speaker 1: spawning fish, and that where there were many beavers, there
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  Speaker 1: were always few fish. Maybe he reasoned as to why
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  Speaker 1: fish hunting was poor, and he went hungry, so unable
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  Speaker 1: to cope singly with whole tribes of his enemies, he
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  Speaker 1: worked to destroy their dams. How this in turn destroyed
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  Speaker 1: the beavers will be seen in the feud in which
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  Speaker 1: Nature had already schemed that he should play a part
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  Speaker 1: with Kazan and Gray Wolf. A dozen times during this night,
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  Speaker 1: broken tooth halted to investigate the food supplies along the banks.
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  Speaker 1: But in the two or three places where he found
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  Speaker 1: plenty of the bark on which they lived, it would
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  Speaker 1: have been difficult to have constructed a dam. His wonderful
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  Speaker 1: engineering instincts rose even above food instincts, and when each
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  Speaker 1: time he moved onward, no beaver questioned his judgment by
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  Speaker 1: remaining behind. In the early dawn, they crossed the burn
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  Speaker 1: and came to the edge of the swamp domain of
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  Speaker 1: Kazan and Gray Wolf. By right of discovery and possession,
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  Speaker 1: that swamp belonged to the dog and the wolf. In
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  Speaker 1: every part of it. They had left their mark of ownership.
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  Speaker 1: But Broken Tooth was a creature of the water, and
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  Speaker 1: the scent of his tribe was not keen. He led
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  Speaker 1: on traveling more slowly. When they entered the timber just
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  Speaker 1: below the windfall home of Kazan and Gray Wolf, he halted,
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  Speaker 1: and clambering ashore, ballaced himself upright on his webb hind
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  Speaker 1: feet and broad four pound tail. Here he had found
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  Speaker 1: ideal conditions. A dam could be constructed easily across the
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  Speaker 1: narrow stream, and the water could be made to flood
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  Speaker 1: a big supply of poplar, birch, willow and alder. Also,
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  Speaker 1: the place was sheltered by heavy timber, so that the
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  Speaker 1: winters would be warm. Broken Tooth quickly gave his followers
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  Speaker 1: to understand that this was to be their new home.
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  Speaker 1: On both sides of the stream, they swarmed into the
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  Speaker 1: near by timber. The babies began at once to nibble
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  Speaker 1: hungrily at the tender bark of willow and alder. The
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  Speaker 1: older ones, every one of them now awa working engineer,
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  Speaker 1: investigated excitedly breakfasting by nibbling off a mouthful of bark now,
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  Speaker 1: and then that day the work of home building began
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  Speaker 1: Broken Tooth himself selected a big birch that leaned over
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  Speaker 1: the stream, and began the work of cutting through the
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  Speaker 1: ten inch butt with his three long teeth. Though the
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  Speaker 1: old patriarch had lost one tooth, the three that remained
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  Speaker 1: had not deteriorated with age. The outer edge of them
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  Speaker 1: was formed of the hardest enamel, the inner side was
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  Speaker 1: of soft ivory. They were like the finest steel chisels,
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  Speaker 1: the enamel never wearing away, and the softer ivory replacing
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  Speaker 1: itself year by year as it was consumed. Sitting on
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  Speaker 1: his hind legs, with his fore paws resting against the tree,
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  Speaker 1: and with his heavy tail giving him a firm balance,
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  Speaker 1: Broken Tooth began gnawing a narrow ring entirely around the tree.
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  Speaker 1: He worked tirelessly for several hours, and when at last
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  Speaker 1: he stopped to rest, another workmen took up the task. Meanwhile,
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  Speaker 1: a dozen beavers were hard at work cutting timber. Long
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  Speaker 1: before Broken Tooth's tree was ready to fall across the stream,
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  Speaker 1: a smaller poplar crashed into the water. The cutting on
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  Speaker 1: the big birch was in the shape of an hour glass.
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  Speaker 1: In twenty hours, it fell straight across the creek, while
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  Speaker 1: the beaver prefers to do most of his work at night,
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  Speaker 1: he is a day laborer as well, and Broken Tooth
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  Speaker 1: gave his tribe but little rest during the days that followed.
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  Speaker 1: With all most human intelligence, the little engineers kept at
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  Speaker 1: their task. Smaller trees were felled, and these were cut
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  Speaker 1: into four or five foot lengths. One by one, these
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  Speaker 1: lengths were rolled to the stream, the beavers pushing them
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  Speaker 1: with their heads and forepaws, and by means of brush
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  Speaker 1: and small limbs, they were fastened securely against the birch.
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  Speaker 1: When the framework was completed, the wonderful cement construction was begun.
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  Speaker 1: In this the beavers were the masters of men. Dynamite
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  Speaker 1: was the only force that could hereafter break up what
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  Speaker 1: they were building. Now under their cup like chins, the
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  Speaker 1: beavers brought from the banks a mixture of mud and
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  Speaker 1: fine twigs, carrying from half a pound to a pound
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  Speaker 1: at a load, and began filling up the framework with it.
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  Speaker 1: Their tasks seemed tremendous, and yet Broken Tooth's engineers could
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  Speaker 1: carry a ton of this mud and twig mixture during
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  Speaker 1: a day and night. In three days, the water was
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  Speaker 1: beginning to back until it rose about the butts of
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  Speaker 1: a dozen or more trees, and was flooding a small
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  Speaker 1: area of brush. This made work easier from now on.
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  Speaker 1: Materials could be cut in the water and easily floated.
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  Speaker 1: While a part of the beaver colony was taking advantage
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  Speaker 1: of the water, others were felling trees end to end,
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  Speaker 1: with the birch laying the working frame of a dam
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  Speaker 1: a hundred feet in width. They had nearly accomplished this
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  Speaker 1: work when one morning Kazan and Gray Wolf returned to
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  Speaker 1: the swamp. End of Chapter nineteen of Kazan by James
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  Speaker 1: Oliver Kurwood. Recording by Leonard Wilson of Springfield, Ohio.