72 WILD NEIGHBORS CHAP. 
tion of the water, to be turned on its back, when 
it would be as helpless as a tortoise but for this 
sharp spike, the point of which it deflects and 
forces into the sand, thus lifting its hinder parts, 
and enabling it to roll over upon its feet again. 
Moreover, were it not for this natural leaping-pole, 
which is planted firmly in her rear as a brace, the 
female horse-foot would be unable to push her 
carapace into the sand, and thus make the burrow 
which she requires for her eggs. 
Many of the smaller, bivalved mollusks, or 
“shell-fish,’ of sandy ocean-shofes are persistent 
burrowers, and all delve tail foremost. The com- 
mon soft clam is a good example. Here the 
pointed, pliable tip of the body, which may be 
called its tail, is the tool used; and on page 159 of 
my “Country Cousins,’! the way in which the 
operation is cleverly performed by the pretty little 
Donax, or wedge-shell, is fully explained. 
The adroitness with which animals have caught 
fish with their tails as lures and sometimes as 
lines, forms the theme of many a barbaric legend 
and myth. The Norse people say that the bear 
once had a long tail, but under the advice of the 
fox, who was jealous of bruin’s rivalry in the 
matter of caudal adornment, he lowered it through 
a hole in the ice as a fish-line, and held it there 
1 Country Cousins. Short Studies in the Natural History of the 
United States. By Ernest Ingersoll. Pages 252. Illustrated. 
Square 8vo. Harper & Brothers, New York, 1884. Cloth, $2.50. 
