1020 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM. 



in each case to Parliament. If this recommendation were 

 widely carried into effect, the result would be that on those 

 grounds where spat happens to fall, the grantees would be 

 in a state of prosperity so long as the supply lasted ; whilst 

 where no spat falls, and brood unattainable, except at 

 exorbitant prices, as is the case this year with " Natives," 

 both proprietors and fishermen would be in financial straits, 

 and the latter deprived of one of their principal sources of 

 living. It is well known that spat sometimes falls at one 

 place and then at another. 



It is to the interest of oyster merchants, whether single 

 individuals or corporate bodies, to keep up the price of 

 their wares ; capitalists can afford to do this by refusing to 

 supply the market when there is any probability of its 

 being glutted, whereas the poor fishermen have not the 

 means of storing their oysters during a time of plentiful 

 supply, or of living in the interim if they are stored. They 

 are therefore obliged to sell what they have caught on 

 public grounds to the companies at whatever price the 

 latter choose to give, or else hawk them about the country 

 offering them for sale at reduced prices ; though they well 

 know oysters are kept quite long enough out of water when 

 first brought on shore from the deep-sea beds, and great 

 risk is run if they are transported elsewhere. 



Further, the fishermen, who generally live a " hand-to- 

 mouth ' existence, can only afford to take a very small 

 share in a company presumably got up to benefit them ; 

 a bad year, sickness or improvidence, causes them to part 

 with the small share they possessed, and the company 

 drifts into the hands of one or two capitalists. 



This is no supposititious case, as we feel convinced that 

 in some of the companies now existing by far the greatest 

 number of shares are in the hands of "long-shore moneyed 



