694 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM. 



The Government is paying every attention to the matter, 

 and is laying down, at the expense of the nation, a model 

 pare of oyster culture in order to teach to those interested 

 in the subject the most modern processes for the cultiva- 

 tion of oysters, and so replenish with the products the 

 natural beds, now almost completely exhausted by, no doubt 

 culpable abuses. 



This district possesses the most favourable conditions 

 that can be imagined for fisheries, because, owing to the 

 unevenness of the bottom of the sea, with an exception of 

 the estuaries, drag-nets cannot be used ; on account of the 

 geographical position formed by a line from east to west, 

 where the very many estuaries and small rivers deposit in 

 great abundance food for fish, due to the fertile lands that 

 they run through ; and so the inland estuaries favourable to 

 the increase of the production of fish, there are many good 

 elements given by nature to that privileged coast. 



Some enterprising foreigners, encouraged by the 

 abusive capture of oysters which is allowed to take place in 

 Portugal, and by the high prices at which these molluscs 

 are valued on account of their large size, easy production, 

 and superior medicinal conditions attributed to them, intend 

 to utilise the natural beds, and so drag them, heedless of 

 all wasteful destruction ; but the Government has taken 

 notice of it, and never will permit any establishments 

 beyond those applied to the production of this favourite 

 mollusc. 



In his " Basis for Legislation on Fishery Questions," 

 Lieut. Col. Sola, speaking of the depletion of oysters in 

 Spain, says, when we speak of the depletion, or complete 

 exhaustion of fisheries, it must be understood that these 

 terms are not used in an absolute sense, but only so far as 

 they affect the supply for the use of mankind, or in other 



