Now there are few people clothed in sane 

 minds who do not like raw oysters. Mark this, 

 however : when you see a person wash raw oys- 

 ters, keep out of his way ; he has lost either his 

 wits or his morak. The only two creatures I 

 ever knew to wash raw oysters were Mux and 

 an oyster-dealer in Cambridge Street, Boston. I 

 saw this dealer take up a two-gallon can that had 

 just arrived at his store, and dump the dark 

 salty shell-fish into a great colander, stick the 

 end of a piece of rubber hose in among them, 

 turn the water on, and stir and soak them. How 

 white they got ! How fat they got ! How their 

 ghastly corpses swelled ! 



Mux did not wash his to see them swell, but 

 simply that he might take no chances with dirt 

 • — or poison, for I used to think sometimes that 

 he thought I was trying to poison him. He was 

 desperately fond of oysters. But who could cast 

 his pearls, or, to be scientifically and literally 

 correct, his mothers of pearls, before such a 

 swine? Mux had just one plateful of oysters 

 while I was his keeper. They were nice plump 

 fellows, and when I saw the maniac soak one all 

 stringy and tasteless I poured his wash-water 

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