NOTES ON OYSTER CULTURE. 265 



morial Usage^ without the consent of such Person " {cf. supra, 

 p. 202^ and note). A Report by the Board of Trade respecting 

 their proceedings under this part of the Act is laid annually before 

 both Houses of Parliament.^ There follow then clauses concerned 

 with the protection of oyster beds^ whether held under this Act or 

 independently of it^ vesting ownership of the oysters absolutely 

 in the grantees or owners of the beds " for all purposes, civil, 

 criminal, or other/^ and providing penalties for such offences as 

 dredging for ballast or depositing rubbish on the beds, supposing 

 their limits to have been sufficiently well marked out. The first 

 schedule to the Act contains the Convention of 1867 between 

 France and England relative to fisheries in the seas between the two 

 countries ; for various reasons this Convention has never come into 

 operation, but Article xi, prohibiting the fishing for oysters between 

 June 16th and August 31st outside the three-mile limit between 

 lines running from the North Foreland to Dunkirk, and from Land's 

 End to Ushant, has been brought into effect by agreement between 

 the Governments (Rep. Sel. Comm. Oyster Fisheries, 1876, ans. 5, 

 Mr. T. H. Farrer). 



Two Acts, 32 and 33 Vict., c. 31, and 38 Vict., c. 15, deal respec- 

 tively with the Langston Fishery Order and with the Heme Bay 

 Company, and are not of general interest. 



An attempt was made in 1876 (39 Vict., Bill 65) to prevent the 

 sale of any oysters from May to August inclusive, but the Bill fell 

 through, and a less rigorous clause was substituted for it in The 

 Fisheries (Oyster, Crab, and Lobster) Act, 1877 (40 and 41 Vict., c. 42).t 

 This prohibited the sale or purchase of " deep-sea " oysters from 

 June 15th to August 4th, and of other oysters from May 14th to 

 August 4th, unless (1) taken in the waters of a foreign state ; (2) 

 cured in some way ; (3) " intended for the purpose of oyster culti- 

 vation within the same district in which the oysters were taken, or 

 were taken from any place for cultivation with the sanction of the 

 Board of Trade. '^ Power was also given by this Act to the Board 

 of Trade to restrict or prohibit during a period not longer than one 

 year the taking of oysters from any particular bank or bed on the 

 application of fishermen of the district, or of certain bodies specified. 

 It was further enacted that an unopposed Order of the Board of 

 Trade, under Part iii of the Sea Fisheries Act, 1868, might be con- 

 firmed by an Order in Council instead of an Act of Parliament. A 

 Bill to repeal the restrictions laid by the last Act on the sale of 

 '^ deep-sea " oysters (50 Vict., Bill 151) was dropped. 



* References to these Reports are appended below. 



t This Act was the outcome of the interesting and valuable Report from the Select 

 Committee on Oyster Fisheries, 1876. 



