"We were in a storm coming here," explained Sue. "We were on a boat and
it rocked like anything, didn't it, Bunny?"

"Yes, it rocked a lot," he agreed. "Come on," he called to his sister.
"Let's go over and dig clams."

"Where can you dig clams?" asked Harry eagerly. Anything about the
seashore interested him, as it was his first summer at the beach.

"They get hard clams away out in the cove," explained Bunny. "But soft
clams grow over there where the tide is out."

"Clams don't grow," declared Sue. "They aren't like apples."

"Yes, clams do grow," declared Bunny. "Else how could a little clam get
to be a big one. They grow over there, in that place where there isn't
any water," went on Bunny. "And when the tide is out we dig for 'em."

"I was up on my grandpa's farm once, and I helped dig for potatoes in
the ground," said Harry. "But I never dug for clams. I'd like to."

"We'll show you how," offered Bunny. "Mother lets us dig soft clams, and
she makes chowder of 'em. Come on, we'll go over and dig clams."

Harry was very glad of this chance for fun, and when Mrs. Brown had said
her two children might go, and when Mrs. Slater had also consented to
let her boy accompany his two new playmates, they set off.

"There isn't any water on the flats when the tide is out," said Mrs.
Brown. "Bunny and Sue often go there to dig clams, and we can see them
from here."

Soft clams are not like hard clams. The shell is a sort of bluish black
and is quite thin, so it is easily crushed. The soft clam is long and
thin, instead of being almost round, like a hard clam.

A soft clam lives down in the mud or sand under water. Within his shell
the soft clam has a long tube, which seems as if made of rubber, for it
can be stretched out greatly, or made so small as to fit inside the
shell.

When the tide covered the low flats at one part of Christmas Tree Cove
the soft clams could not be found. But when the tide went out it left
bare a large space of sand and sticky mud, or muck. Then was the time to
dig soft clams.

Bunny and Sue knew how to do it. They used a little shovel, though a
regular clammer uses a short-handled hoe, digging the wet earth away
much as a farmer digs away the earth from a hill of potatoes. Down under
the surface the clams are found.

"Here's a good place to dig," said Bunny, as he led Sue and Harry
through little pools of water to the clam flats. "Sue, you hold the
basket and Harry and I will dig."