SEA-FISHERIES LABORATORY. 163 



nation must not be forgotten. Here we have, on the one 

 hand a growing menace to the public health, and on the 

 other the threatened reduction, if not destruction, of a 

 great industry. The prospects of averting, or at any rate 

 of minimising, both these evils depend upon a more 

 intimate and accurate knowledge of the connection 

 between the shell-fish and the disease germs, and the 

 relation of both to their common environment ; and the 

 opportunity has thus been given for scientific investiga- 

 tions on a large scale and leading to results of far-reaching 

 importance. 



The local bacteriological work on shell-fish was begun 

 in the spring of 1895, when my late colleague Professor 

 (afterwards Sir Hubert) Boyce was visiting me at Port 

 Erin and we joined in work, both on the shore and in the 

 Biological Station, on the bacteriology of re-laid American 

 Oysters (obtained from Liverpool and Fleetwood) under 

 various conditions. These experiments showed that 

 oysters laid down only a short distance apart differed 

 enormously in their bacterial contents. Taking Bacillus 

 coli as an example, a certain standard culture made from 

 an oyster laid near the mouth of a small sewer gave 

 17,000 colonies, while a similar culture from those laid 

 a little distance off in purer water had only 10 colonies. 

 This work at Port Erin formed the subject of a paper read 

 by Professor Boyce and myself before Section D. (Zoology) 

 at the Ipswich meeting of the British Association in 

 September, 1895. Shortly after this, in October, 1895, 

 public attention was directed to the subject in a sensa- 

 tional manner by the serious outbreak of enteric fever 

 amongst those at the Stirling County ball, who had 

 unwisely supped on oysters which were afterwards proved 

 to be in a very doubtful condition. This occurrence Mas 

 followed by a wide-spread "oyster scare" which led to a 



