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On (he Danish Oyster Banks. By M. Henrik Kroyer. 



The active editor of the Naiurhistorisk Tidskrift, whom we 

 have to thank for so many valuable contributions to the Fauna 

 of Denmark, gives us a full account of the condition of the 

 Danish oyster-banks, in a little work published at Copenhagen, 

 entitled De danske Osterbanker, et Bidrag til Kundskab om Dan- 

 marks Fiskerier. While his treatise is more especially interest- 

 ing as discussing a subject of political economy, and must have 

 possessed double interest for Denmark just at the moment of 

 its appearance, because the period for farming out the royal 

 banks, as they were considered, had partly elapsed, and was 

 partly impending, and because an opinion had been expressed 

 in Jiitland in favour of throwing open the oyster fishery ; yet, 

 at the same time, it is not without importance for the natural 

 history of the oyster. It gives us a clear idea of the mode of 

 occurrence of this species of shell-fish ; it weakens and over- 

 turns many hitherto received prejudices respecting their mode 

 of living ; and, even in its statistical and historical portion, is 

 calculated to afford the naturalist much information and amuse- 

 ment. 



In the first section of his work, the author treats of the na- 

 tm*al history of the oyster ; and, in the second, of the Danish 

 oyster banks — of the mode of taking the oysters, and the re- 

 quisite apparatus — of the oyster trafiic in Schleswig and Jut- 

 land — and of the oyster dams. The third part contains histo- 

 rical, notices of the oyster-banks in Schlesw ig and Jutland. An 

 engraving represents the various fishing implements; and a 

 particularly interesting illustration of the essay is a map of 

 Denmark and its ducal possessions, in which the banks that 

 are at present fished, as well as those which have been aban- 

 doned, are represented. As M. Kroyer not only visited the 

 various oyster localities, and collected many notices on the 

 spot, but has likewise made use of the register and minutes of 

 the Board of Management of the Rents, the results of his in- 

 vestigations are undoubtedly as accurate and exact as can be 



* From Wiegmann's Archiv/iir Naturgeschichte for 1839. 



