380 THE OCEAN WORLD. 



down, no newly-cut, well-buttered brown bread, did that solitary 

 anonymous man inaugurate the first oyster banquet." 



Anotlier story makes the act of eating the first oyster a punish- 

 ment. Tlie poetaster also had his views on the subject : — 



' ' The man had sure a palate covered o'er 

 With brass, or steel, that on the rocky shore 

 First broke the oozy oyster's pearly coat. 

 And risked the living morsel down his throat." 



And e\-er since men have gone on eating oysters. Emperors and 

 poets, princes and priests, pontiff's and statesmen, orators and 

 painters, have feasted on the favoured bivalve. 



Man has made use of the oyster from the most remote antiquity. 

 Among the debris of festivals which precede by ages the epoch of 

 written history, oyster-shells are found. On the " midden heaps " of 

 northern Europe they are often discovered, mingling with other 

 rubbish and with stone implements, evidently the refuse of very 

 ancient feasts. We liave all read of the classic feasts of the Romans, 

 which began with oysters brought from fabulous distances. Vitellius 

 ate oysters all day long, and the idea prevailed that he could eat 

 a thousand. Calisthenes, the philosopher, was a passionate oyster 

 eater ; so was Caligula ; Seneca the wise could eat his hundred ; 

 and the great Cicero did not despise the savoury bivalve. Lucullus 

 had sea-water brought to his villa from the shores of Campania, in 

 which he bred them in great abundance for the use of his guests. 

 To another Roman, Sergius Grata, we owe the original idea of the 

 oyster-park. He invented the oyster-pond, in which he bred oysters, 

 not for his own table, but for profit. 



Among modem celebrities whose -love of oysters is recorded, we 

 may mention Louis XL, who feasted the learned doctors of the 

 Sorbonne once a year on oysters. Another Louis invested his cook 

 with an order of nobility, in reward for his skill in cooking them. 

 Cervantes loved oysters, although he satirised oyster-dealers. Marshal 

 Turgot used to eat a hundred or two just to whet his appetite. 

 Rousseau, Helvetius, Diderot, the Abbe Raynal, and Voltaire, are 

 recorded lovers of oysters. Danton, Robespierre, and other of the 

 revolutionists, frequented the oyster scJotis of Paris. Cambaceres 

 was famous for his oyster feasts ; and it is recorded of the great 

 Napoleon that he always partook of the bivalve on the eve of his 

 great battles, when they could be procured. 



In short, it has been demonstrated as a gastronomic truth that 

 there is no feast worthy of a connoisseur where oysters do not come 

 to the front. It is their office to open the way by that gentle e.xcite- 



