M. COSTE'S REPORT. 251 



of taking up any new idea, the carrying out of which 

 requires energy and self-decision. Fortunately for the 

 interests of pisciculture at least, the Emperor of the 

 French, though beyond this much-to-be-dreaded epoch 

 in individual history, is remarkably receptive of new 

 suggestions, so that novel implements of war for slay- 

 ing men, arid of industry for multiplying oysters and 

 other fish, interest his busy intellect. Hence he is a 

 keen pisciculturist. His imperial will, directing the 

 national wealth, brooks no long delay between the 

 announcement of a theoretical improvement and the 

 carrying of it out in practice. M. Coste having roused 

 his attention to the importance of pisciculture in gene- 

 ral, and of ostreo-culture especially as the means of 

 replenishing the exhausted oyster-beds on the coasts of 

 France, measures were speedily adopted with the view 

 of experimentally testing the value of M. Coste's sug- 

 gestions. The result is before us in a report to the 

 Emperor, with a copy of which M. Coste has obligingly 

 favoured us. We shall avail ourselves of its contents, 

 in the hope that their publication in this country 

 may stimulate to similar modes of procedure those who 

 lament the rapidly-advancing destruction of the oyster- 

 beds on the shores of Great Britain and Ireland. 



The philosophic naturalist commences with the asser- 

 tion that the sea can be cultivated like the land ; and 

 that to the State belongs the duty of putting into exer- 

 cise those appliances of which science guarantees the 

 success, and of then handing over to a grateful popula- 

 tion the harvests prepared by its care. He deplores 

 the destruction of eighteen out of the twenty-three 

 formerly valuable oyster-banks at Rochelle, Marennes, 

 Rochefort, &c., the oyster-rearers at which places, being 

 no longer able to stock their ponds, have to go to the 

 British coast for a supply, which they find both expen- 

 sive and insufficient. The fifteen oyster-banks in the 

 bay of Saint Brieuc, which formerly yielded an annual 

 revenue of about 4000 francs, and employment to 1400 



