76 THE OYSTEK. 



white, and fat, has a very small beard, and is very 

 digestible. During a south-west wind, which brings to 

 these beds the microscopic spores of sea vegetation and 

 animalcules upon which it delights to feed, from the 

 channel, its beard is of a green colour. The Ostend oyster 

 is much prized in Berlin, which it reaches the quickest 

 of any from the sea, (in thirty-six to forty hours,) 

 and consequently lives there several days, remains the 

 longest fresh, and can be sent farthest. Last winter 

 Ostend oysters were sent to Moscow and Odessa, where 

 they arrived still good and tasty. The former were 

 seventeen days, and the latter eleven days on their 

 way. Scarcely any other kind of oysters could be sent 

 to such a distance. In the autumn of 1847, after the 

 opening of the Cologne-Minden Eailway, the first trial 

 was made of sending these oysters to Berlin, via 

 Cologne. The result was most satisfactory ; they sold 

 for 1^ thalers the hundred. This caused no little sen- 

 sation, especially among the old oyster dealers, who 

 were accustomed to receive from five to six, even from 

 eight to nine thalers per hundred. The good folks of 

 Berlin are now supplied with abundant fresh and fine 

 oysters. The Ostend natives may be obtained from the 

 owner of the oyster beds in Ostend. I speak of Berlin, 

 as the Germans are great oyster-eaters, and the North, 

 in a great measure, is supplied from thence. 



In Bmssels, Antwerp, Ghent, Bruges, and Lille, 

 Ostend oysters are eaten with slices of home-baked bread, 

 and butter. They are served up in their shells, open, 

 and not broken apart. They have a tender, fragrant, 

 and melting flesh, and are only half the size of ordinary 



