BATTLEFIELD OF THE SHORE 



too avian to carry through. And after all the smug- 

 ness of our ancestral line — with its slow, watchful 

 waiting, and wading through safe and sane slime, 

 and keeping to the unexciting, sure path marked 

 Up and Onward or Excelsior — some of them I am 

 sure named Eric or Bertie or Reginald — I go 

 back to the clean, smashing waves and I see the lim- 

 pets and hydroids and crabs, and I look into the 

 bright knowing eyes of the gobies and we feel some- 

 thing in common. I again recall what Colonel Theo- 

 dore Roosevelt said to me many years ago, " If I 

 were the last of my race I would rather be a sabre- 

 toothed tiger than a field mouse," and I hope in my 

 heart I am not a typical middle-liner. There is some- 

 thing that transcends comfort and contentment, 

 safety and sanity. I would rather be a goby than 

 a salamander. 



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