[59] THE OYSTER AND OYSTER-CULTURE. 741 
been held up very often to the inhabitants of the German coasts, in 
order to incite them to establish in their seas similar places for the 
artificial harvesting of oysters. The writers who did so knew neither 
the nature of the oyster nor the character of our seas. They might just 
as well have said to the inhabitants of the lower portion of the Elbe: 
‘¢ Lay out vineyards, for in 1874 the department of the Lower Loire pro- 
duced 1,914,427 hectoliters of wine, and the department of Gironde 
5,123,643 hectoliters.” In Egypt there is nothing lacking, except water, 
in order to produce dates and wine in abundance upon the desert which 
stretches from Cairo to Suez. So itis with us; all we lack in order to carry 
on successfully artificial oyster-breeding upon the mud-fiats of the North 
Sea are mild winters, with no ice, and security against the force of storm- 
floods. There is food enough there to feed billions of oysters. The old 
English method of oyster-culture was much simpler than the new French 
method. The work consisted chiefly in transplanting young oysters from 
the natural banks along the coast to suitable beds in the mouths of riv- 
ers, Where they became fat and well flavored. They also removed the 
mud and plants from these new beds, destroyed as many of the enemies 
of the oyster as possible, and improved the ground by scattering over 
it the shells of oysters and other mollusks. This industry is carried 
on in a much better manner at Whitstable, where there is an oyster 
company which, it is claimed, has been in existence for six or seven hun- 
dred years. It numbers over 400 members, who work 120 vessels. Only 
the sons of those who are, or have been, members are admitted into 
the guild. In 1793 an act of Parliament adjudged to this company, as 
their property, an extent of oyster-ground about two miles long and 
the same in breadth, situated in the mouth of the Thames, and which 
they had claimed up to that time only by right of possession. This ter- 
ritory consisted partially of natural oyster-banks, partially of beds upon 
which oysters from the open sea had been placed to spawn, and par- 
tially of beds upon which oysters from along the coast had been placed 
to fatten. In order to still further improve these beds, empty oyster- 
Shells, sent back principally from London, were often scattered over 
them. The Whitstablers consider that a thick layer of oyster-shells 
forms the very best bed for oysters, and they pride themselves that 
they possess the “ best oyster-grounds in the world,” as I myself have 
heard them say. The fecundity of the oysters upon their fattening-beds 
is very small. The cultivation of the oyster is carried on at Colchester, 
Burnham, and other places along the coast of England very much as it 
is at Whitstable. From these places many oysters are taken to Ostend. 
The efforts which have been made to bring living oysters from North 
America to England and plant them there have notsucceeded well enough 
to warrant imitation. But if they could succeed in transplanting large 
quantities of young oysters from the breeding-stations of Normandy and 
Brittany to the excellent feeding-grounds of England, English oyster- 
breeding would.probably soon take a very significant upward tendency, 
