It was a pretty sight and a pretty shot; but I would not have had the stillness and the moonlit picture spoiled by the blare of that murderous musket for the pelts of fifty muskrats, and as the gun was coming to Uncle Jethro's shoulder, I slipped my hand under the lifted hammer.
With just an audible grunt of impatience the old negro understood,—it was not the first good shot that my love of wild things had spoiled for him,—and the unsuspecting muskrat swam on to the dam.
"They rubbed noses."
A plank had drifted against the bank, and upon this the little creature scrambled out, as dry as the cat at home under the roaring kitchen stove. Down another road came a second muskrat, and, swimming across the open water at the dam, joined the first-comer on the plank. They rubbed noses softly—the sweetest of all wild-animal greetings—and a moment afterward began to play together.
"Two little brown creatures washing calamus."