AN OYSTER-FARM AT ARCACHON. 265 



covered by a shipwrecked Irishman named Walton. To 

 supply himself with food, he made a net to capture sea- 

 birds, and to fix his instrument of capture securely, he 

 planted stout stakes or posts in the mud of the fore-shore . 

 Tn a short time he found that large quantities of mussels, 

 torn by the tidal action from some natural bed, had ad- 

 hered to the net fixtures. These in due course matured 

 into fine-flavoured animals, which were eagerly purchased 

 by connoisseurs. On this hint the French fishermen 

 acted ; rows of strong stakes were planted in the Bay of 

 Aiguillon, which, when interlaced by boughs and branches, 

 supplied the spat with an excellent resting-place. Thus 

 sprang up a regular system of mussel cultivation, which 

 appears to have suggested to M. Coste, the pisciculturist, 

 some of those ideas of oyster-culture which he was de- 

 veloping with much industry almost about the same time 

 that Hyacinthe Boeuf began his successful experiment. 

 The reports which M. Coste addressed to the Imperial 

 Government led to its adoption of the oyster-farms as a 

 source of national wealth, well deserving of State aid and 

 encouragement. 



The most carefully constructed are those established 

 under the imperial patronage, in the basin of Arcachon, 

 a sheltered arm of the sea, about thirty-five miles from 

 Bordeaux. 



Arcachon, now a fashionable bathing resort, was, a few 

 years ago, a small fishing village, celebrated for its abun- 

 dant supply of naturally-bred oysters. As the scalps, or 

 beds, were of great extent, it was supposed they could 

 never be exhausted, and thousands of bushels of capital 

 oysters were annually sent to all parts of France, as well 

 as to foreign countries. After these beds had been ex- 



