506 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM. 



operating in this country to lessen the yield of the native 

 oyster beds have led to like results in many parts of France, 

 where the fishery has been left too much in the hands of 

 the local fisher folk. As a consequence of M. Bouchon- 

 Brandely's report, the French Government proposes to 

 take further measures for the improvement 'of the oyster 

 fisheries of the Republic, and to prevent their depletion, a 

 step which ought to stimulate enterprise of a like kind in 

 this country, where, owing to causes which it is unneces- 

 sary to indicate, the supply of this delicious and nutritive 

 shell-fish is neither cheap nor plentiful, when it ought to 

 be both. 



