cedar-fibres, with paddle-blade and cunning traps he dislodged the
weeds from their moorings, but they slipped their slimy lengths
through his eager hands: his best spear with its attendant coil
was gone.

The following year he was sealing again off the coast of Point Grey,
and one night, after sunset, he observed the red reflection from the
west, which seemed to transfer itself to the eastern skies. Far
into the night dashes of flaming scarlet pulsed far beyond the head
of False Creek. The color rose and fell like a beckoning hand, and,
Indian-like, he immediately attached some portentous meaning to
the unusual sight. That it was some omen he never doubted, so he
paddled inland, beached his canoe, and took the trail towards the
little group of lakes that crowd themselves into the area that lies
between the present cities of Vancouver and New Westminster. But
long before he reached the shores of Deer Lake he discovered that
the beckoning hand was in reality flame. The little body of water
was surrounded by forest fires. One avenue alone stood open. It
was a group of giant trees that as yet the flames had not reached.
As he neared the point he saw a great moving mass of living things
leaving the lake and hurrying northward through this one egress. He
stood, listening, intently watching with alert eyes; the zwirr of
myriads of little travelling feet caught his quick ear--the moving
mass was an immense colony of beaver. Thousands upon thousands
of them. Scores of baby beavers staggered along, following their
mothers; scores of older beavers that had felled trees and built
dams through many seasons; a countless army of trekking fur-bearers,
all under the generalship of a wise old leader, who, as king of the
colony, advanced some few yards ahead of his battalions. Out of
the waters through the forest towards the country to the north they