pia] OYSTER CULTURE. 765 
sea-water, which communicate with the ocean by means of sluices and 
flood-gates, that can be opened at each flood-tide or at pleasure; here 
it is that the oysters are deposited, after being taken from the beds, in 
order to protect them, and make them convenient for the demands of 
trade. dn this stagnant water, charged with organic material and pro- 
tected from all agitation, the oysters increase in size very rapidly, become 
fat, and lose the bftter flavor and slightly tough consistency common to 
the natural oyster. It is greatly to be regretted that the steady diminu- 
tion of this mollusk will not allow the oystermen to retain the oysters in 
their parks but a very short time; the full benefit of the park is then not 
attained, while at the same time the continually increasing price makes 
the oysters articles of luxury reserved for the tables of the rich. Often, 
one can see placed on sale in our markets oysters which have been sent 
in immediately after being taken, and without having been placed in a 
park at all. 
This mode of cultivating oysters by means of parks forms an import- 
ant industry for the inhabitants along the coasts between the harbor 
of Brouage and the mouth of the Seudre, and constitutes the chief source 
of wealth of the territory of Marennes. There, in ponds or parks, to 
which they give the name of claires, and which differ from ordinary 
parks in that they do not receive any water from the sea except dur- 
ing spring-tides, while the parks receive it at every flood; there, I 
repeat, the oystermen, known under the name of amareillewrs, cultivate 
their oysters, procured either from the banks of the neighboring coast, 
or from the coasts of Brittany, Normandy, or Vendée, and produce 
those delicious bivalves known in the southern and central portions of 
France as green oysters. Oysters which leave the ocean very light in 
color, after being placed in the claires at Marennes for a short time, 
acquire a deep green color, most pronounced in the gills; these are the 
veritable oysters of Marennes, which are preferred to any other growth. 
The reason of this is simple, and the color has little, or nothing, to do 
with it. The oyster, deposited when young in the claires—and this is 
an indispensable condition—undergoes a careful nursing, a sort of stab- 
ling, and acquires, at the same time that it receives its characteristic 
color, a fineness and delicacy of flavor and a fatness which it could 
not acquire upon the muddy and disturbed natural banks; from this 
cause arises its real superiority, a superiority which it would acquire 
equally well in any other park where it could be treated with sim- | 
ilar care and where it would even retain its natural color. This is so 
true that adult oysters placed in the claires at Marennes rapidly acquire 
the green color, but always remain just what they were when they were 
taken from the sea, although they present all the external characteris- 
tics of the most highly prized oysters. As to the peculiar color of the 
oysters which have been kept in the claires, it has been attributed to 
certain marine alge growing in that neighborhood, to the presence of a 
