156 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
OysTER MEMOIR AND OystTER BILL. 
(W. A. HERDMAN.) 
The work | have been doing at intervals during the last 
few years, along with my colleague Professor Boyce, upon 
oysters and their supposed connection with disease in 
man having come to a conclusion, the Committee have 
printed and issued an account of the investigation as a 
thin quarto volume* of about 60 pages and 8 partly coloured 
plates, under the heading of ‘‘ Lancashire Sea-Fisheries 
Memoir No. I.” I hope it may be regarded as creditable 
to the Committee to have undertaken the publication, in 
this manner, of researches which add to our knowledge of 
an important shell-fish, and havea bearing upon public 
health questions, upon proposed legislation, and upon 
valuable fishing industries. t 
As this Oyster Memoir has recently been sent to all 
members of the Committee, I need not refer to it further 
than to say that it brought out clearly the need of some 
control of the oyster trade in order that imjurious oysters 
might not be offered for sale. Two events have recently 
occurred, either of which might lead to the effective con- 
trol required. These are the formation of the Oyster 
Industries Association and the introduction of an Oyster 
Bill into the House of Lords by Lord Harris. The Bill 
met with considerable criticism, and was referred to a 
Select Committee of the House, which reported in July; 
but the Bill was eventually dropped. It is to be hoped 
* <“* Oysters and Disease,’ published by Geo. Philip and Son, London and 
Liverpool, 1899 ; price 7s. 6d. net. 
+ It may serve to remove in part the reproach levelled against the Sea- 
Fisheries Committees when, in the evidence given last June before Lord 
Harris’s Select Committee on the Oyster Bill, it was said by the medical 
authorities at the Local Government Board, that these Committees had never 
done anything to investigate the sanitary condition of our fisheries. 
