3/8 THE OCEAN WORLD. 



af various ages, attached to a piece of wood : a being oysters of 

 twelve to fifteen months, b five or six months, c three to four months, 

 D one to two months, and e oysters twenty days after birth. 



The species of oysters usually eaten are the common oyster 

 {Osttra cdulis, Linn.) of our own coasts and the opposite shore, and 

 the horsefoot oyster {O. hippopus, Linn.) On the Mediterranean 

 coast are the rose-coloured oyster ((9. rosacea, Favanue), and the 

 milky oyster {O. iacfcola, Moquin-Tandon), besides the small and 

 little-known crested oyster ( O. cristata, Born), and the folded oyster 

 [O. p/icata, Chemnitz). On the Corsican coast is the oyster called 

 foliate {O. lamcUosa, Brocchi). 



There are two principal varieties of the common oyster dredged 

 on the French coast, Avhich differ in size and delicacy of flavour. 

 These are the Cancale and Ostend oyster. When the first has been 

 fed for some time in the oyster park, and has assumed its greenish 

 hue, it is designated the Marenna oyster, from " the park " so named 

 in the Bay of Seudre. Of this green colour we shall speak else- 

 where. 



Who believed L^ncle Jack when he told us in our youth of oysters 

 growing on trees, and oysters so large that they required to be 

 carved like a round of beef — of oysters on the Coromandel coast as 

 large as soup-plates ? Nevertheless Uncle Jack's stories were true : 

 there are oysters which require carving, and oysters have been 

 plucked oft" trees. In some parts of America they grow very large. 

 Virginia possesses nearly 2,000.000 acres of oyster-beds. The sea- 

 board of Georgia is famed for its immense supplies ; the whole coast 

 of Long Island, extending to 115 miles, is occupied with them; and 

 all over the vStates evidence is to be seen of the estimate in which the 

 favoured bivalve is held by the American people. 



Natural oyster-beds are found in bays, estuaries, and other 

 sheltered sinuosities of the coast, with shelving and not too rocky 

 bottoms, such places being, according to the natural law of produc- 

 tion, favourable for the increase of the colony. Such banks abound 

 in every sea. In France the oyster-beds of Rochelle, of Rochefort, 

 the Isles of Re and Oleron, the Bay of St. Brieuc, of Cancale, and 

 Granville, are famous for the quality of their produce. 



On tlie Danish coast there are from forty to fifty oyster-banks, 

 situated on the west coast of Schleswig ; the best bed lying between 

 the small isles of Sylt, Amron, Fohr, Pelworm, and Nordstrand. At 



attached to the block by means of glue for exhibition. Oysters always attach 



themselves by the back of the rounded shell near to the hinge, as stated at p. 373. 



