I 2 14 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM. 



those materials can be tasted which, dissolved in fluids, 

 come in contact with the organs of taste. Hence the 

 flavour of the oyster depends upon substances which are 

 either in solution in the juices of the body of the oyster, or 

 which become dissolved in the mouth of the eater. Fresh, 

 living oysters, as is the case with all sea-animals, contain 

 very much water. In order to estimate the proportion of 

 water, the greatest care must be taken in removing the 

 oyster from the shell, especially when the shell-muscle 

 uniting the two valves is cut. The exterior of the body 

 must first be dried with blotting-paper, the body then 

 weighed, and finally placed under the air-pump and all the 

 water drawn out. Two Schleswig-Holstein oysters which 

 were taken from the shell and dried, weighed together 

 14*70 grams, and after all the water had been drawn from 

 them they weighed only 3*05 grams. They thus contained 

 79*25 per cent, of water, and only 20*75 per cent, of solid 

 material. Two other large oysters, which had been pre- 

 viously deprived of their gills and mantles, weighed 

 together 20*55 grams ; after being thoroughly dried they 

 weighed 4*809. Thus their edible portion contained 

 76*64 per cent, of water and 23*36 per cent, of solid 

 material. 



A large number of investigations upon Schleswig- 

 Holstein oysters demonstrated that the entire animal con- 

 tained from 21*5 to 23 per cent, of solid material, while the 

 body, without the gills and mantle, contained from 23 to 

 24*5 per cent, of solid material, (c) 



(c) I am indebted to Professor O. Jacobson, of Rostock, for all 

 the information that I have given in Chapter 12, in regard to the 

 chemical constituents of the Schleswig-Holstein oysters. In June, 

 1871, when he lived in Kiel, he analyzed at my request a number of 

 oysters which I had received fresh from the Schleswig-Holstein beds. 



