252 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM, 



then employed, during the season, about 1500 men, 1000 

 women and children, and 250 boats. 



Think of this, ye oyster-eaters ! Think that ye are 

 doino- such is the wise ordination of an overruling Provi- 



o O 



dence some good when you are swallowing your ante- 

 prandial oyster, and are giving employment to some por- 

 tion of those 3000 people who work for you at Jersey, 

 besides helping to feed the cold-fingered fishmonger, who, 

 with blue apron and skilful knife, tempts you to " Hanother 

 dazzen, sir ?" 



Fancy if you can, also, that curiously courteous 

 exchange which goes on every Christmas between our 

 oyster-eating country cousins and our turkey and goose- 

 loving Londoners, To the man 



" Who hath been long in city pent 

 'Tis very sweet to gaze upon the fair 

 And open brow of heaven : to breathe a prayer 

 Full in the face of the blue firmament " 



sings John Keats. Oh, if he had been but an oyster-eater, 

 that article from the " Quarterly," savage and slaughterly, 

 would not have killed him ; but it is also very sweet to gaze 

 upon a turkey, a leash of birds, a brace of pheasants, and, 

 as Mrs. Tibbetts hath it, "a real country hare." Such a 

 present is promptly repaid by a fine cod packed in ice, 

 and two barrels of oysters. How sweet are these when 

 eaten at a country house, and opened by yourselves, the 



Lovell, author of " Edible British Mollusca," " Jersey oysters were 

 very scarce, and the beds in a bad condition." And, in his Report for 

 1 88 1 (p. 50), Lieutenant Winslow, as it in corroboration of the latter, 

 states that "The oyster fisheries of Jersey afforded employment to 400 

 vessels. In six or seven years the dredging became so extensive, and 

 the beds so exhausted, that only three or four vessels could find em- 

 ployment, and the crews of even that small number had to do addi- 

 tional work on shore, in order to support themselves." 



