Jim Hagarty
2019
Although I reside in a country where countless beavers live and gnaw away at trees, building their dams, I have never seen one in the wild. How could I go 68 years without encountering a beaver when they are apparently all around us?
I could understand if I lived in Italy where, until recently, a beaver had not been seen since 1471, but in Canada? So last year an Italian spotted the first beaver in his country in 547 years in a land where they were hunted for food till they disappeared, but I should be able to trip over one every time I go outside but I never have.
I know I am looking at this through the wrong end of the telescope, but I’m afraid I am a bit of a beaver skeptic when it comes to this Italian story. So, I am to believe that a fella named Luigi or Mario or whatever draws his arrow and lays low a beaver in 1471 and having done so, announces that that is the very last beaver in his country. How did he know there wasn’t another one hiding behind a tree, waiting for the big dumb cluck to leave so he could chop it down?
Did the authorities in 1471 send out investigators across Italy to see if anyone had seen any more beavers? Well did they? And did they all report back that not a one had been spotted? I just have a hard time believing that there wasn’t even one wily beaver rippin’ around the forests and waterways in 1472 or even as late as 1572, for that matter.
I really think what happened is they stumbled upon the 15th century equivalent of a Jim Hagarty who had never seen an actual beaver in his entire life and when they asked him if he’d seen one, he answered, honestly, “No.” The investigators decided that was good enough for them after which they sat down under an ungnawed tree and polished off a flask of wine while an undetected beaver kept an eye on them from behind whatever kind of trees grew in Italy in 1471.
I am sure that’s how it went down and I am glad that’s settled.
