gone now. We had lots of fun with these traps, and I hope you boys
will."

There were fourteen traps. We greased them up and put them in good
condition. And one Saturday early in the fall we got Davy to go with us
to the great meadows and look the ground over. Davy said, "We must find
their paths." When we found one, we looked for the best place to set a
trap. "Now, see here. Here's a place where they come out of the water;
and they climb up on that old root. Take the axe, Ben, and cut a notch
in it a little under the water; and I'll smear the notch with mud so
that the rat won't notice it."

[Sidenote: TRAPPING MUSKRATS]

We opened the trap, and set it in the notch; and then fastened the
chain, which was attached to the trap, to a stick; and drove the stick
into the bank a little way up the stream. "Let's put the next trap in
the path. Drive the stick into the ground, so that they can't carry the
trap off. That's right. Now set the trap and sprinkle some leaves over
it to hide it."

In some of the brooks we drove a couple of sticks into the bank, so that
the trap would rest on them, a couple of inches beneath the surface of
the water, and fastened the chain up stream. We drove a stick into the
bank about ten inches above the trap, and stuck a sweet apple on the end
of it. "There, that looks real tempting. A rat will come swimming
along, and when he sees that apple, he will jump for it; and if you are
lucky, he will fall into the trap."

"Who's that over on the island in the meadow?"

"Captain Wooton. He's girdling trees."

"What's he doing that for?"

"To kill them off. That's the way the Indians cleared their land. The
trees die, and when they are dead, he sets them on fire in the wet
season, and burns them up. He was a sea-captain, and married one of the
Winship girls, and old Mr. Winship gave them this land."

"Well, let's hurry up and set the rest of the traps. I've got to get
home to my chores."

Edmund lived on the further side of the meadows and close to them, and
in going to school passed several brooks that flowed into them. I lived
above the meadows, and had to go out of my way to reach them. So Edmund
looked after nine traps, and I took care of five. Every morning we
examined the traps, to see if we had caught anything, and to set them
again, and bait them. If a trap was not in sight, we pulled on the
chain, and generally found a muskrat in the trap, drowned, with his hair
all soaked down on hi