Every day the men came in their high rubber boots to work, and every day there were more ditches and the marsh was drier. By the time that the flowers had all ripened their seeds and the forest trees were bare, the marsh was changed to dry ground, and the Muskrats could find no water there to splash in. One night, and it was a very, very dark one, they came together to talk about winter.
"It is time to begin our cold-weather houses," said one old Muskrat, "I have never started so soon, but we are to have an early winter."
"Yes, and a long one, too," added his wife, who said that Mr. Muskrat never told things quite strongly enough.
"It will be cold," said another Muskrat, "and we shall need to build thick walls."
"The question is," said the old Muskrat who had first spoken, "where we shall build."
"Why?" asked the little Muskrat, pulling at his mother's tail.
"There is no water here except in the ditches," said the oldest Muskrat, "and of course we would not build beside them."
"Why not?" asked the little Muskrat. And this time he actually poked his mother in the side.
"Sh-h-h!" said she. "How many times must I speak to you? Don't you know that young Muskrats should be seen and not heard?"
"But I can't be seen," he whimpered. "It is so dark that I can't be seen, and you've just got to hear me."
Of course, after he had spoken in that way to his mother and interrupted all the others by his naughtiness, he had to be punished, so his mother sent him to bed. That is very hard for young Muskrats, for the night, you know, is the time when they have the most fun.
The older ones talked and talked about what they should do. They knew, as they always do know, just what sort of winter they were to have, and that they must begin to build at once. Some years they had waited until a whole month later, but that was because they expected a late and mild winter. At last the oldest Muskrat decided for them. "We will move to-morrow night," said he. "We will go to the swamp on the other side of the forest and build our winter homes there."
All the Muskrats felt sad about going, and for a minute it was so still that you might almost have heard a milkweed seed break loose from the pod and float away. Then a gruff voice broke the silence. "I will not go," it said. "I was born here and I will live here. I never have left this marsh and I never will leave it."