SUPPLEMENT. 1255 



But instead of any falling-off, the next year shows a 

 manifest increase : 



1870-1 4,997,540 



After this the beds were fished only in alternate years, and 

 yielded 



1872-3 7,441,720 



1874-5 40,360,000 



The outcome of all this is that, under one continuous 

 system of extreme restrictive regulation, the returns show : 



i st. For five years (i 861-66) a rapid decrease, down 

 to a ninth of the produce of 1860-61, which was the end 

 of a long period of slight regulation. 



2nd. For five years (1867-71) a slight and slow in- 

 crease up to about one-fourth of the produce of 1860-61. 



3rd. For five years (1870-75) an increase rising in the 

 last year, 1875, to 40,360,000 (that is to say, seeing that 

 1874 crop was not fished, 20,000,000) ; or, practically, the 

 same yield as that with which the fifteen-year period 

 started. 



It is certainly astonishing to have this case held up as 

 an example of the efficiency of regulations, and especially 

 of the enforcement of close time. 



Thus, even if the open-sea oyster beds could be 

 watched and protected as efficiently as those of the bays 

 of Cancale and Arcachon, such protection is no guarantee 

 against the greatest fluctuation in the produce of the beds, 

 and the disappearance of the oysters from some of them. 

 But who that knows anything practically of the manner in 

 which the open-sea oyster leads are fished, can imagine 

 that any such protection is practicable ? Is the Govern- 

 ment to survey the oyster beds every summer, and then 

 send a gunboat to watch every oyster bed, and limit the 

 quantity of oysters taken ? And if it does not do so, what 



