IN THE UNITED KINGDOM AND FRANCE. 25 



The total sale of oysters is given by the officials at 18,000,000 

 from 1859 to 1867 ; but by Dr. Kemmerer the correct number is 

 stated to be 40,000,000, a discrepancy accounted for by the fact 

 that correct returns are not made by the peasants for fear of in- 

 creased taxation. 



There is no reason to doubt but that the decline in production 

 at Re, Oleron, and other places where foreshore cultivation was so 

 remarkably effective at the commencement is to be attributed to 

 the dirtier state of the collectors, and also to the fact that the 

 natural beds having been depopulated in the first instance to stock 

 the pares, the parent oysters were subsequently sold, and thus the 

 source of spat was removed. 



The proprietors themselves admit this to have been the case, 

 thinking sufficient spat would settle from the young ovsters at- 

 tached to the stones. This expectation, however, they found to 

 be delusive, and in the present season means are to be taken to 

 renew the stock and collectors. 



England. 



The diminution in oyster production which has taken place 

 in England is not so great as in France — still it has been very 

 considerable. 



Great natural beds exist, or have existed in the estuaries of 

 the Thames, Medway, Blackwater, the rivers of Essex and 

 Suffolk, in the Solent, in Langston and Chichester harbours, 

 Milford, Tenby, and other places. 



The Royal Commissioners in their report on the sea fisheries of 

 the United Kingdom, page 105, state — " That the supply of 

 oysters has very greatly fallen off during the last three or four 

 years," and this statement needs no confirmation from us. The 

 same causes as exist in France may be assigned for it. 



Besides the public beds before named, a very large number 

 of oysters are obtained annually from private grounds in the 

 Thames, the Blackwater, Colne, Roach rivers, in Essex, and 

 from the rivers in Suffolk, from the Isle of Wight, from Cornwall, 

 and elsewhere. These fisheries are held either by corporations, 

 as at Colchester and Ipswich, or by private persons and com- 

 panies as leasees or otherwise. Such private oyster beds are 

 almost invariably well cultivated, very considerable trouble and 

 expense being bestowed on them by the proprietors, whose 

 efforts are mainly directed to keeping the bottom of the river free 

 from slob and weeds, and destroying the enemies of the oyster, 

 as starfish, crabs, the dog whelk {purpura Lapillus), and rough 

 whelk (murex erinaceus), &c, engravings of which will be seen 

 on the next page. 



The first encloses the oyster in its grasp, and breaking off the 

 edge of the shell contrives to devour the fish, whilst the whelks 

 bore through the shell, and, it is supposed, abstract some fluid 

 portion of the oyster, leaving the more solid parts to be eaten by 

 the crabs, which follow in the wake of the whelk. 



