[5] OYSTER CULTURE. 757 
marine, came to carry on the new industry, which occupied an extent of 
400 hectares (about 960 acres) of emergent lands, made over by the ad- 
ministration. In 1863, during six tides and upon only one-half of the 
restocked lands, the oystermen took sixteen millions of oysters—that is 
to say, more than the public fisheries of Cancale and Granville have ever 
produced. Not long ago [ had occasion to visit an artificial park, which 
had been instituted only three years before, at a total cost of $2,400, 
and which sold at the time of my visit for $8,000. 
On the island of Ré three thousand people migrated from the interior 
to occupy the emergent sea-territory, ceded to them in individual lots 
by the government. The condition of these lands necessitated arduous 
and long-continued labors on the part of the men, since these portions 
of the island were simply vast wastes, where to-day more than two 
hundred parks can be seen in full activity, occupying the entire coast 
. from the point of Rivedoux to that of Loix, a distance of twelve miles, 
and covering an area of nearly 205 hectares (about 492 acres). In 
these parks, or prepared oyster-beds, there are to-day, on an average, 
six hundred oysters to the square meter, or a total of two billion oysters, 
representing a value, when of marketable size, of about 40,000,000 francs 
($8,000,000). Before this new industry had transformed the arid and 
desolate character of these portions of the coast, the 18,000 inhabitants 
of the island of Ré had no other source of revenue except from the growth 
of barley and the culture of the vine, whence there were 1ew returns, the 
production being slight and of poor quality, and by fishing, which pro- 
duced about 50 frances ($10) per month for each boat employed. 
This state of affairs, instead of growing better, grew worse until the 
year 1858, when Hyacinthe Boeuf, of Rivedoux, upon the island, under- 
took for the first time the artificial breeding or cultivation of oysters 
upon eighteen hundred meters of emergent lands granted him by the 
state. Boeuf was a mason, and commenced his labor by inclosing 
his property with a wall of rocks. He then covered the soil with 
straw and branches to consolidate the mud and render the place 
suitable for the reception of the oysters which he proposed bring- 
ing from Brittany, since the coast of the island was entirely destitute 
of them. What, then, was his astonishment when he saw the stones of 
his wall become covered spontaneously with a young growth of oysters, 
which appeared in the water surrounding the island and probably came 
from the parks along the coast of Nieulle; they were so numerous that 
they averaged about two thousand young oysters per square meter. 
He at once demolished his wall, stone by stone, and placing the oysters 
upon the bed of the park, he succeeded, by favoring their development 
by intelligent care, in creating on the island an industry destined to bring 
wealth and prosperity. His example was soon followed by others, and 
numerous parks were laid out, so that in 1860 oysters were sold to the 
value of 3,150 franes ($630), and in 1863, 53,000 francs ($10,600), without 
counting the thousands of oysters deposited in the fattening-ponds, the 
