176 THE RECENT BIRD TRACKS, ETC. 
pieces of the upper layer to carry away with us as a speci- 
men, and in doing so discover that there are tracks of the 
same kind on the next layer underneath. On a previous 
day the birds ran about over the mud as to-day, leaving 
the impressions of their feet; these hardened in the sun ; 
the tide came up softly and flowed over them, depositing 
a new layer of mud upon them, thus preserving them. 
This layer is pitted with little pear-shaped impressions. 
“Why! these must be rain prints,” suggests our compan- 
ion, who has begun to be interested in mud-studies, “and 
the storm must have come from the west too, because the 
prints are not round but pear-shaped, and from the direc- 
tion in which the small end of the impression is turned, 
you can see whence the wind was blowing at the time; 
besides, the shower could not have lasted long else it 
would have made the mud too soft, and none of the prints 
would have been preserved. By the bye, we had a 
slight shower this morning, just a little while after the 
tide was full. TIl venture that near high tide mark we 
shall find some record of it. Yes! here they are, and 
these, too, are not round, for you remember that there was 
a smart breeze blowing at the time, and so the drops struck 
slantingly, making oblong impressions, the smaller ends 
of which are directed to the point of the compass from 
which the wind blew.” Shells, bones of fish and other 
animals becom buried in these beds, together with the 
remains of plants, leaves of trees, pine cones, or other 
fruits ; but it is an exceedingly rare thing to find on these 
flats a dead bird, unless it is one which has been killed by 
a iil wen cecum in next number. 
