This morning the mill pond looked like a quiet workshop. The beavers had already formed a polite line, and each log received a ruler no longer than a teaspoon.
We asked at the kiosk by the mill. A woman with a paper bag of rolls said a beaver had nodded first to the water, then to the willow, and only then measured a seat exactly the width of one nap. They never guess, she told us. They measure.
The park keeper pinned a note to the fence: benches will be ready when the logs have said good morning. A day later the same beaver came back with the same ruler and sat on the finished seat just long enough to check that the willow still approved.