THE CLAM. 189 
basket filled, the clam-pickers trudge back again 
to the lodge—and next to open him. He is not 
a native to be astonished with an oyster-knife ; 
once having shut his mouth, no force, saving that 
of dashing his shell into atoms, will induce him to 
open it. But the wily redskin, if she does not 
know the old fable of the wind and the sun trying 
their respective powers on the traveller, at least 
adopts the same principle on the luckless clam ; 
what knife and lever fail to do a genial warmth 
accomplishes. The same plan the sun adopted 
to make the traveller take off his coat (more 
persuasive, perhaps, than pleasant) the Indian 
squaw has recourse to in order to make the 
clam open his shell. 
Hollowing out a ring in the ground, about 
eight inches deep, they fill the circle with large 
pebbles, made red-hot in the camp-fire near 
by, and on these heated stones put the bivalve 
martyr. The heat soon finds its way through 
the shelly armour, the powerful ropes that hold 
the doors together slacken, and, as his mansion 
gradually grows ‘too hot to hold him,’ the door 
opens a little for a taste of fresh air. Biding 
her chance, armed with a long, smooth, sharp- 
pointed stick, sits the squaw—dusky, grim, and 
dirty—anxiously watching the clam’s movements. 
