Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 August 1886 — A QUEER ADVENTURE. [ARTICLE]

A QUEER ADVENTURE.

Nearly Drowned by a Clam Weighing Three Hundred Pounds. [From Youth’s Companion.] As I ran I kept my eyes fixed on Brown, whcvwas acting in a singular manner. After every few seconds his head would disappear beneath the water in which he stood, then it would appear again. He seemed to be struggling violently. As I approached him he threw up his hands and cried out in accents that haunt me still: “For heaven’s sake, Lieutenant, quick, and help me!” I dashed out to him through water up to my waist. “What is it? What has hold of you?” I eiclaimed. “It’s a big oyster or a big clam,” he groaned. “I was wading here, and stepped into it, I expect. Its shell closed—gripped my ankle—and to save my life I can’t get away—and the tide will soon be over our heads here!” he added, with something almost like a sob. He had been struggling here for fifteen or twenty minutes. I had heard of the tridacena gigas, or monster clam of this coast, and instantly realized the danger of his situation. “Courage, old fellow!” I said. “I’ll stick by you. Here, hold this paddle and the hatchet.” I then ducked down under water, and with my hands felt about his foot. The huge mollusk had what might be well termed a death-grip on him. The creature’s shell was several feet long, and of proportionate breadth, and the weight of the shell-fish must have been at least 300 pounds. The creature was attached to the coral rock by a grisly byssus as thick as my arm. liaising myself, I got breath, then, seizing the paddle, thrust the shaft of it between the converging edges of the two valves of the shell, and using it as a lever attempted to pry the shell apart. But I could not open it. Brown, too, ducking down, seized hold with his hands and pulled with all his strength; but, exerting all our power, we could not release the monster’s hold. Again and again I threw my whole weight on the shaft' of the paddle, and at length broke it. By this time the water was up to my shoulders when I stood up. lully realizing that whatever I did must be done in a few minutes more, else the poor fellow would drown, I snatched the hatchet from Brown’s hand, and, diving, tried to cut under the shell, to break the creature’s anchorage on the rock. With might and main I cut and hacked —then rose an instant for breath—then down and at it again. But it seemed as though I could not cut through the tough muscle. Four times I dived, and, with frantic haste, cut at those tough byssi. “It stirs!” at length Brown cried, bracing his weight upon his free foot and lifting at it. Then with a final blow the byssus was severed, and the buoyancy of the water aiding us, we dragged the great mollusk—still fast to Brown’s ankle—back to higher ground on the reef. Here the water was waist-deep, however, and' I looked anxiously around for Mac, in the lakatoi. To my inexpressible joy he was close at hand, and between us we lifted Brown, with his now captured captor, into the canoe. Even then we could not, both of us together, pry the valves of the shell apart enough to release Brown’s foot, till with a knife we had reached in and completely divided the tridacena—sawing asunder the hinge-muscles at the base of the bivalve. It was truly a gigantic clam, and, as a poetic retribution upon it for this attempt on the life of one of our number, we ate a portion of its flesh for our supper, but found it rather tough. Brown’s ankle was severely bruised and v renched, and he suffered for many a day from the vise-like grip of the huge mollusk.