Harry was very glad of this chance for fun, and when Mrs. Brown had said her two children might go, and when Mrs. Slater had also consented to let her boy accompany his two new playmates, they set off.
"There isn't any water on the flats when the tide is out," said Mrs. Brown. "Bunny and Sue often go there to dig clams, and we can see them from here."
Soft clams are not like hard clams. The shell is a sort of bluish black and is quite thin, so it is easily crushed. The soft clam is long and thin, instead of being almost round, like a hard clam.
A soft clam lives down in the mud or sand under water. Within his shell the soft clam has a long tube, which seems as if made of rubber, for it can be stretched out greatly, or made so small as to fit inside the shell.
When the tide covered the low flats at one part of Christmas Tree Cove the soft clams could not be found. But when the tide went out it left bare a large space of sand and sticky mud, or muck. Then was the time to dig soft clams.
Bunny and Sue knew how to do it. They used a little shovel, though a regular clammer uses a short-handled hoe, digging the wet earth away much as a farmer digs away the earth from a hill of potatoes. Down under the surface the clams are found.
"Here's a good place to dig," said Bunny, as he led Sue and Harry through little pools of water to the clam flats. "Sue, you hold the basket and Harry and I will dig."
"Well, this time I will, 'cause Harry's new," answered Sue. "But after this I'll dig, too."
Bunny had brought two shovels, and, giving the new boy one, Sue's brother used the other. He dug a hole in the mucky, black sand, and Harry did likewise.
"When you see something that looks like a black stone pick it up," advised Bunny. "'Cause that's a clam."