Grabbing a handful of figs, and some pilot bread from
the cracker box, I paddled away after the otter; for that is an animal
which one has small chance to watch nowadays. Besides, I had found a
den over near the brook, and I wanted to find out, if possible, how a
mother otter teaches her young to swim. For, though otters live much
in the water and love it, the young ones are afraid of it as so many
kittens. So the mother--
But I must tell about that elsewhere. I did not find out that day; for
the young were already good swimmers. I watched the den two or three
hours from a good hiding place, and got several glimpses of the mother
and the little ones. On the way back I ran into a little bay where a
mother shelldrake was teaching her brood to dive and catch trout.
There was also a big frog there that always sat in the same place, and
that I used to watch. Then I thought of a trap, two miles away, which
Simmo had set, and went to see if Nemox, the cunning fisher, who
destroys the sable traps in winter, had been caught at his own game.
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