APPENDIX. 291 



bottom. There is no doubt, that where they are so abun- 

 dant, enclosures might be made of hurdles, and hard crabs 

 collected and kept until the time of shedding. Soft crabs, as 

 they would then be, command a high price in our city 

 markets, varying from seventy-five cents to a dollar and a 

 half per dozen. 



Shell-fish is the popular name bestowed by unscientific 

 persons on the Crustacea and mollusca, and no other desig- 

 nation could so well cover the multitudinous variety of 

 forms which are embraced in these extensive divisions of 

 the animal kingdom. Fanciful disquisitions on shell-fish 

 and on marine zoology have been intruded on the public 

 of late till they have become somewhat tiresome ; but as 

 our knowledge of the natural history of all kinds of sea 

 animals, and particularly of oysters, lobsters, crabs, etc., is 

 decidedly on the increase, there is yet room for all that I 

 have to say on the subject of these dainties ; and there are 

 still unexplored wonders of animal life in the fathomless sea 

 that deserve the deepest study. 



The economic and productive phases of our shell-fish 

 fisheries have never yet, in my opinion, been sufiioiently 

 discussed, and when I state that the power of multiplica- 

 tion possessed by all kinds of Crustacea and mollusca is even 

 greater, if that be possible, than that possessed by finned 

 fishes, it will be obvious that there is much in their natural 

 history that must prove interesting even to the most general 

 reader. Each oyster, as we have seen, gives birth to almost 

 incredible quantities of young. Lobsters also have an 

 amazing fecundity, and yield an immense number of eggs — 

 each female producing from twelve to twenty thousand in a 

 season ; and the crab is likewise most prolific. I lately 

 purchased a crab weighing within an ounce of two pounds. 



