The Rambles of an Idler 



out the footprints of a spotted sand-piper. The 

 green heron and purple grakles have been here 

 and little curved lines, diminutive crescents in 

 orderly array, of pairs, suggest that a mud-min- 

 now rested at this place on its fins, before the 

 tide ran out. Still smaller markings are a mat- 

 ter of doubt, but many aquatic bugs and spiders 

 run lightly over the shining mud and leave faint 

 traces of their wanderings. At least one frog 

 has been squatting here and left a body print, 

 and if I had not seen that a shapeless depres- 

 sion was made by a grasshopper while still 

 floundering in the mud, it would have puzzled 

 the most clever paleontologist to decipher it, 

 had it been fossilized. Five or six representa- 

 tives of the great divisions of life have passed 

 to and fro in the night, and now, not long after, 

 I see but a single sparrow, hear a crow in the 

 distance, and observe no other evidence of ani- 

 mal life. Here, truly, not only is all tame, but 

 almost lifeless, judging from the present out- 

 look; but what a different story is told by the 

 footprints in the mud, the narrow strip of bare 

 earth hemming in a little meadow brook. 



Having taken the initial step of determining 

 what forms of life have been here, there is an- 



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