206 



RAMBLES ABOUT HOME. 



puddles at low tide, as I've told you, and here let me tell 

 you something more about this. You know wherever 

 there is a good-sized cobble-stone on the sand, the out- 

 goin' tide washes a little hollow on the lower side of the 

 stone, and in this the little minnies take refuge when the 

 water 's fallin'. The plovers know this just as well as I 

 do, and go spookin' 'round ; but seein' 'em, the minnies 

 get clear under the stone out o' sight. How the plovers 

 smell 'em out, I don't know, but they'll just splash and 

 dance 'round, and somehow seem to scare 'em out, and 

 then they gobble the littlest of 'em up. When they are 

 too big, as is mostly the case, they only worry at 'em, for 

 it is only the little wee bits of minnies they can make out 

 to swallow. There's another kind of minnie, or little h'sh 

 o' some sort, they don't disturb, I know, and sometimes 

 a whole regiment of 'em will be on the flats at low tide. 

 They are like little perch in looks, and go off with a skip 

 and a jerk, instead of swimmin'." 



" You mean what are known as ' darters,' I guess. 

 Little fish with big spiny fins, that lie at the bottom of 

 the river and the creek, where it is sandy," I suggested 

 to Uz. 



" That covers the whole ground, boy," he replied, and 

 continued, " and they have been something of a puzzle to 

 me. Last spring, when I was huntin' for my sheath- 

 knife at low tide off Long Bar, I was lookin' at the bottom 

 as I floated along, hopin' to see my knife. About half- 

 way down the bar, I see the carcass of a musk-rat some- 

 body had skinned, lyin' on the bottom, and just about a 

 thousand of these little ' skip- jacks,' as I call 'em, were 

 feastin' on the rat. I halted a minute, and watched 'em. 

 They would kind o' haul off, and then give a dart at the 

 rat's carcass, and catchin' a bit in their jaws, take it away 

 with 'em and gobble it up when they'd got fairly settled 



