Productive Power of Shell-Fish—Varieties of the Crustacean Family—Study of the Minor Shell-Fishes—Demand for Shell-Fish—Lobsters—A Lobster Store-Pond Described—Natural History of the Lobster and other Crustacea—March of the Land-Crabs—Prawns and Shrimps, how they are caught and cured—Scottish Pearl-Fisheries—Account of the Scottish Pearl-Fishery—A Mussel-Farm—How to grow Bait.

Shell-fish is the popular name bestowed by unscientific persons on the crustacea and mollusca, and no other designation 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 sufficiently discussed, and when I state that the power of multiplication 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, and it contained a mass of minute eggs equal in size to a man’s hand; these were so minute that a very small portion of them, picked off with the point of a pin, when placed on a bit of glass, and counted by the aid of a powerful microscope, numbered over sixty, each appearing of the size of a red currant, and not at all unlike that fruit: so far as I could guess the eggs were not nearly ripe. I also examined about the same time a quantity of shrimp eggs; and it is curious that, while there are the cock and hen lobster, I never saw any difference in the sex of the shrimps: all that I handled, amounting to hundreds, were females, and all of them were laden with spawn, the eggs being so minute as to resemble grains of the finest sand.

Although the crustacean family counts its varieties by thousands, and contains members of all sizes, from minute animalculÆ to gigantic American crabs and lobsters, and ranges from the simplest to the most complex forms, yet the edible varieties are not at all numerous. The largest of these are the lobster (Astacus marinus) and the crab (Cancer pagurus); and river and sea cray-fish may also be seen in considerable quantities in London shell-fish shops; and as for common shrimps (Crangon vulgaris) and prawns (PalÆmon serratis), they are eaten in myriads. The violet or marching crab of the West Indies, and the robber crab common to the islands of the Pacific, are also esteemed as great delicacies of the table, but are unknown in this country except by reputation.

Leaving old and grave people to study the animal economy of the larger crustacea, the juveniles may with advantage take a peep at the periwinkles, the whelks, or other mollusca. These are found in immense profusion on the little stones between high and low water mark, and on almost every rock on the British coast. Although to the common observer the oyster seems but a repulsive mass of blubber, and the periwinkle a creature of the lowest possible organisation, nothing can be further from the reality. There is throughout this class of animals a wonderful adaptibility of means to ends. The turbinated shell of the periwinkle, with its finely-closed door, gives no token of the powers bestowed upon the animal, both as provision for locomotion (this class of travellers wherever they go carry their house along with them) and for reaping the tender rock-grass upon which they feed. They have eyes in their horns, and their sense of vision is quick. Their curiously-constructed foot enables them to progress in any direction they please, and their wonderful tongue either acts as a screw or a saw. In fact, simple as the organisation of these animals appears to be, it is not less curious in its own way than the structure of other beings which are thought to be more complicated. In good truth, the common periwinkle (Littorina vulgaris) is both worth studying and eating, vulgar as some people may think it.

Immense quantities of all the edible molluscs are annually collected by women and children in order to supply the large inland cities. Great sacks full of periwinkles, whelks, etc., are sent on by railway to Manchester, Glasgow, London, etc.; whilst on portions of the Scottish sea-coast the larger kinds are assiduously collected by the fishermen’s wives and prepared as bait for the long hand-lines which are used in capturing the codfish or other GadidÆ. As an evidence of how abundant the sea-harvest is, I may mention that from a spot so far north as Orkney hundreds of bags of periwinkles are weekly sent to London by the Aberdeen steamer.

From personal inquiry made by the writer a few months ago it was estimated that for the commissariat of London alone there were required two millions and a half of crabs and lobsters! May we not, therefore, take for granted that the other populous towns of the British empire will consume an equally large number? The people of Liverpool, Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Dublin are as fond of shell-fish as the denizens of the great metropolis; at any rate, they eat all they can get, and never get enough. The machinery for supplying this ever-increasing demand for lobsters, crabs, and oysters is exceedingly simple. On most parts of the British coast there are people who make it their business to provide those luxuries of the table for all who wish them. The capital required for this branch of the fisheries is not large, and the fishermen and their families attend to the capture of the crab and lobster in the intervals of other business. The Scotch laird’s advice to his son to “be always stickin’ in the ither tree, it will be growin’ when ye are sleepin’,” holds good in lobster-fishing. The pots may be baited and left till such time as the victim enters, whilst the men in the meantime take a short cruise in search of bait, or try a cast of their haddock-lines a mile or two from the shore; or the fishing can be watched over, and when the lobsters are numerous, the pots be lifted every half hour or so. The taking of shell-fish also affords occupation to the old men and youngsters of the fishing villages, and these folks may be seen in the fine days assiduously waiting on the lobster-traps and crab-cages, which are not unlike overgrown rat-traps, and are constructed of netting fastened over a wooden framework, baited with any kind of fish offal, or garbage, the stench of which may be strong enough to attract the attention of those minor monsters of the deep. A great number of these lobster-pots are sunk at, perhaps, a depth of twelve or twenty fathoms at an appropriate place, being held together by a strong line, and all marked with a peculiarly-cut piece of cork, so that each fisherman may recognise his own lot. The knowing youngsters of our fishing communities can also secure their prey by using a long stick. Mr. Cancer Pagurus is watched as he bustles out for his evening promenade, and, on being deftly pitched upon his back by means of a pole, he indignantly seizes upon it with all his might, and the stick being shaken a little has the desirable effect of causing Mr. Crab to cling thereto with great tenacity, which is, of course, the very thing desired by the grinning “human” at the other end, as whenever he feels his prey secure he dexterously hauls him on board, unhooks the crusty gentleman with a jerk, and adds him to the accumulating heap at the bottom of the old boat. The monkeys in the West Indies are, however, still more ingenious than the “fisher loons” of Arran or Skye. Those wise animals, when they take a notion of dining on a crab, proceed to the rocks, and slyly insinuating their tail into one of the holes where the crustacea take refuge, that appendage is at once seized upon by the crab, who is thereby drawn from his hiding-place, and, being speedily dashed to pieces on the hard stone, affords a fine feast to his captor. On the granite-bound coast of Scotland the sport of crab-hunting may be enjoyed to perfection and the wonders of the deep be studied at the same time. A long pole with a small crook at the end will be found useful to draw the crab from his nest, or great fun may be enjoyed by tying during low-water a piece of bait to a string and attaching a stone to the other end of the cord. The crab seizes upon this bait whenever the tide flows, and drags it to its hole, so that when the ebb of the tide recurs the stone at the end of the cord marks the hiding-place of the animal, who thus falls an easy prey to his captor. The natives are the best instructors in these arts, and seaside visitors cannot do better than engage the services of some strong fisher youth to act as guide in such perambulations as they may make on the beach. There are few seaside places where the natives cannot guide strangers to rock pools and picturesque nooks teeming with materials for studying the wonders of the shore.

Lobsters are collected and sent to London from all parts of the Scottish shore. I have seen on the Sutherland and other coasts the perforated chests floating in the water filled with them. They were kept till called for by the welled smacks, which generally made the circuit of the coasts once a week, taking up all the lobsters or crabs they could get, and carrying them alive to London. From the Durness shores alone as many as from six to eight thousand lobsters have been collected in the course of a single summer, and sold, big or little, at threepence each to the buyers. The lobsters taken on the north-east coast of Scotland and at Orkney are now packed in seaweed and sent in boxes to London by railway. The lobsters have been more plentiful, it is thought, in the Orkney Islands of late years; a larger trade has been done in them since the railway was opened from Aberdeen—at all events, more of the animals have been caught, and the prices are double what they used to be in the time of the welled smacks alluded to above. The fisher-folks of Orkney confess that the trade in lobsters pays them well.

All kinds of crustaceans can be kept alive at the place of capture till “wanted”—that is, till the welled vessel which carries them to London or Liverpool arrives—by simply storing them in a large perforated wooden box anchored in a convenient place. Nor must it be supposed that the acute London dealers allow too many lobsters to be brought to market at once; the supply is governed by the demand, and the stock kept in large store-boxes at convenient places down the river, where the sea-water is strong and the liquid filth of London harmless. But these old-fashioned store-boxes will, no doubt, be speedily superseded by the construction of artificial store-ponds on a large scale, similar to that erected by Mr. Richard Scovell at Hamble, near Southampton. That gentleman informs me that his pond has been of good service to him. It is about fifty yards square, and is lined with brick, having a bottom of concrete, and was excavated at a cost of about £1200. It will store with great ease 50,000 lobsters, and the animals may remain in the pond as long as six weeks, with little chance of being damaged. Lobsters, however, do not breed in this state of confinement, nor have they been seen to undergo a change of shell. There is, of course, an apparatus of pipes and sluices for the purpose of supplying the pond with water. The stock is recruited from the coasts of France and Ireland; and to keep up the supply Mr. Scovell has in his service two or three vessels of considerable size, which visit the various fisheries and bring the lobsters to Hamble in their capacious wells, each of which is large enough to contain from 5000 to 10,000 animals.

The west and north-west coasts of Ireland abound with fine lobsters, and welled vessels bring thence supplies for the London market, and it is said that a supply of 10,000 a week can easily be obtained. Immense quantities are also procured on the west coast of Scotland. A year or two ago I saw on board the Islesman steamboat at Greenock a cargo of 30,000 lobsters, obtained chiefly on the coasts of Lewis and Skye. The value of these to the captors would be upwards of £1000, and in the English fishmarkets the lot would bring at least four times that sum. As showing how enormous the food wealth of the sea still is, notwithstanding the quantity taken out of it, I may cite here a few brief particulars of a little experiment of a charitable nature which was tried by a gentleman who took a warm interest in the Highland fishermen, and the results of which he himself lately made public. Commiserating the wretchedness which he had witnessed among many, who, although anxious to labour, were unable to procure work, and at the same time feeling that the usual method of assisting them was based on a mistaken principle, this gentleman undertook the establishment of a fishery upon a small scale at his own expense. He therefore expended a sum of £600, with which he procured eight boats, completely equipped, and a small smack of sixteen tons. The crews, consisting of thirty men, he furnished with all the necessary fishing materials, paying the men weekly wages ranging from nine to thirteen shillings, part of the sum being in meal. The result of this experiment was, that these eight boats sent to the London market in a few months as many lobsters as reimbursed the original cost of the fishing plant. The men and their families were thus rescued from a state of semi-starvation, and are now living in comfort, with plenty surrounding their dwellings; and have, besides, the satisfaction of knowing that their present independent condition has been achieved principally by means of their own well-sustained industry.

A very large share of our lobsters is derived from Norway, as many as 30,000 sometimes arriving from the fjords in a single day. The Norway lobsters are much esteemed, and we pay the Norwegians something like £20,000 a year for this one article of commerce. They are brought over in welled steam-vessels, and are kept in the wooden reservoirs already alluded to, some of which may be seen at Hole Haven, on the Essex side of the Thames. Once upon a time, some forty years ago, one of these wooden lobster-stores was run into by a Russian frigate, whereby some 20,000 lobsters were set adrift to sprawl in the muddy waters of the Thames. In order that the great mass of animals confined in these places may be kept upon their best behaviour, a species of cruelty has to be perpetrated to prevent their tearing each other to pieces: the great claw is, therefore, rendered paralytic by means of a wooden peg being driven into a lower joint.

I have no intention of describing the whole members of the crustacea; they are much too numerous to admit of that, ranging as they do from the comparatively giant-like crab and lobster down to the millions of minute insects which at some places confer a phosphorescent appearance on the waters of the sea. My limits will necessarily confine me to a few of the principal members of the family—the edible crustacea, in fact; and these I shall endeavour to speak about in such plain language as I think my readers will understand, leaving out as much of the fashionable “scientific slang” as I possibly can.

The more we study the varied crustacea of the British shores, the more we are struck with their wonderful formation, and the peculiar habits of their members. I once heard a clergyman at a lecture describe a lobster in brief but fitting terms as a standing romance of the sea—an animal whose clothing is a shell, which it casts away once a year in order that it may put on a larger suit—an animal whose flesh is in its tail and legs, and whose hair is in the inside of its breast, whose stomach is in its head, and which is changed every year for a new one, and which new one begins its life by devouring the old! an animal which carries its eggs within its body till they become fruitful, and then carries them outwardly under its tail; an animal which can throw off its legs when they become troublesome, and can in a brief time replace them with others; and lastly, an animal with very sharp eyes placed in movable horns. The picture is not at all overdrawn. It is a wondrous creature this lobster, and I may be allowed a brief space in which to describe the curious provision of nature which allows for an increase of growth, or provides for the renewal of a broken limb, and which applies generally to the edible crustacea.

The habits of the principal crustacea are now pretty well understood, and their mode of growth is so peculiar as to render a close inspection of their habits a most interesting study. As has been stated, a good-sized lobster will yield about 20,000 eggs, and these are hatched, being so nearly ripe before they are abandoned by the mother, with great rapidity—it is said in forty-eight hours—and grow quickly, although the young lobster passes through many changes before it is fit to be presented at table. During the early periods of growth it casts its shell frequently. This wonderful provision for an increase of size in the lobster has been minutely studied during its period of moulting. Mr. Jonathan Couch says the additional size which is gained at each period of exuviation is perfectly surprising, and it is wonderful to see the complete covering of the animal cast off like a suit of old clothes, while it hides, naked and soft, in a convenient hole, awaiting the growth of its new crust. In fact, it is difficult to believe that the great soft animal ever inhabited the cast-off habitation which is lying beside it, because the lobster looks, and really is, so much larger. The lobster, crab, etc., change their shells about every six weeks during the first year of their age, every two months during the second year, and then the changing of the shell becomes less frequent, being reduced to four times a year. It is supposed that this animal becomes reproductive at the age of five years. In France the lobster-fishery is to some extent “regulated.” A close-time exists, and size is the one element of capture that is most studied. All the small lobsters are thrown back to the water. There is no difficulty in observing the process of exuviation. A friend of mine had a crab which moulted in a small crystal basin. I presume that at some period in the life of the crab or lobster growth will cease, and the annual moulting become unnecessary; at any rate, I have seen crabs and other crustaceans taken from an island in the Firth of Forth which were covered with parasites evidently two or three years old.

To describe minutely the exuviation of a lobster, crab, or shrimp would in itself form an interesting chapter of this work, and it is only of late years that many points of the process have been witnessed and for the first time described. Not long ago, for instance, it was doubtful whether or not the hermit-crabs (Anomoura) shed their skin; and, that fact being settled, it became a question whether they shed the skin of their tail! There was a considerable amount of controversy on this delicate point, till the “strange and unexpected discovery” was made by Mr. Harper. That gentleman was fortunate enough to catch a hermit-crab in the very act, and was able to secure the caudal appendage which had just been thrown off. Other matters of controversy have been instituted in reference to the growth of various members of the crustacea; indeed, the young of the crab in an early stage have before now been described by naturalists as distinct species, so great is the metamorphosis they undergo before they assume their final shape—just as the sprat in good time changes in all probability to the herring. Another point of controversy at one period existed in reference to the power of crustaceans to replace their broken limbs, or occasionally to dispense at their own good pleasure with a limb, when it is out of order, with the absolute certainty of replacing it.

When the female crustacea retire in order to undergo their exuviation they are watched, or rather guarded, by the males; and if one male be taken away, in a short time another will be found to have taken his place. I do not think there is any particular season for moulting; the period differs in different places, according to the temperature of the water and other circumstances, so that we might have shell-fish (and white-fish too) all the year round were a little attention paid to the different seasons of exuviation and egg-laying.

The mode in which a hen lobster lays her eggs is curious: she lodges a quantity of them under her tail, and bears them about for a considerable period; indeed, till they are so nearly hatched as only to require a very brief time to mature them. When the eggs are first exuded from the ovary they are very small, but before they are committed to the sand or water they increase considerably in size and become as large as good-sized shot. Lobsters may be found with eggs, or “in berry” as it is called, all the year round; and when the hen is in process of depositing her eggs she is not good for food, the flesh being poor, watery, and destitute of flavour.

When the British crustacea are in their soft state they are not considered as being good for food; but, curiously enough, the land-crabs are most esteemed while in that condition. The epicure who has not tasted “soft crabs” should hasten to make himself acquainted with one of the most delicious luxuries of the table. The eccentric land-crab, which lives far inland among the rocks, or in the clefts of trees, or burrows in holes in the earth, makes in the spring-time an annual pilgrimage to the sea in order to deposit its spawn, and the young, guided by an unerring instinct, return to the land in order to live in the rocks or burrow in the earth like their progenitors. In the fish-world we have something nearly akin to this. We have the salmon, that spends one half its life in the sea, and the other half in the fresh water; it proceeds to the sea to attain size and strength, and returns to the river in order to perpetuate its kind. The eel, again, just does the reverse of all this: it goes down to the sea to spawn, and then proceeds up the river to live; and at certain seasons it may be seen in myriad quantities making its way up stream. The march of the land-crabs is a singular and interesting sight: they congregate into one great army, and travel in two or three divisions, generally by night, to the sea; they proceed straight forward, and seldom deviate from their path unless to avoid crossing a river. These marching crabs eat up all the luxuriant vegetation on their route: their path is marked by desolation. The moment they arrive at the water the operation of spawning is commenced by allowing the waves to wash gently over their bodies. A few days of this kind of bathing assists the process of oviposition, and knots of spawn similar to lumps of herring-roe are gradually washed into the water, which in a short time finishes the operation. Countless thousands of these eggs are annually devoured by various fishes and monsters of the deep that lie in wait for them during the spawning season. After their brief seaside sojourn, the old crabs undergo their moult, and at this period thousands of them sicken and die, and large numbers of them are captured for table use, soft crabs being highly esteemed by all lovers of good things. By the time they have recovered from their moult the army of juveniles from the seaside begins to make its appearance in order to join the old stock in the mountains; and thus the legion of land-crabs is annually recruited by a fresh batch, which in their turn perform the annual migration to the sea much as their parents have done before them.

Before leaving the crabs and lobsters, it is worthy of remark that an experienced dealer can tell at once the locality whence any particular lobster is obtained—whether from the west of Ireland, the Orkney Islands, or the coast of Brittany. The shelly inhabitants of different localities are distinctly marked. Indeed fish are peculiarly local in their habits, although the vulgar idea has hitherto been that all kinds of sea animals herd indiscriminately together; that the crab and the lobster crept about the bottom rocks, whilst the waving skate or the swaggering lingfish dashed about in mid-water, the prowling “dogs” busily preying on the shoals of herring supposed to be swimming near; the brilliant shrimp flashing through the crowd like a meteor, the elegant saithe keeping them company; the whole being overshadowed by a few whales, and kept in awe by a dozen or so of sharks! Nothing can be more different than the reality of the water-world, which is colonised quite as systematically as the earth. Particular shoals of herring, for instance, gather off particular counties; the Lochfyne herring, as I have mentioned in the account of the herring-fishery, differs from the herring of the Caithness coast or that of the Firth of Forth; and any ’cute fishmonger can tell a Tweed salmon from a Tay one. The herring at certain periods move in gigantic shoals, the chief members of the GadidÆ congregate on vast sandbanks, and the whales occasionally roam about in schools; while the PleuronectidÆ occupy sandy places in the bottom of the sea. We have all heard of the great cod-banks of Newfoundland, of the fish community at Rockall; then is there not the Nymph Bank, near Dublin, celebrated for its haddocks? have we not also the Faroe fishing-ground, the Dogger Bank, and other places with a numerous fish population? There are wonderful diversities of life in the bosom of the deep; and there is beautiful scenery of hill and plain, vegetable and rock, and mountain and valley. There are shallows and depths suited to different aspects of life, and there is life of all kinds teeming in that mighty world of waters, and the fishes live

The prawn and the shrimp are ploughed in innumerable quantities from the shallow waters that lave the shore. The shrimper may be seen any day at work, pushing his little net before him. To reach the more distant sandbanks he requires a boat; but on these he captures his prey with greater facility, and richer hauls reward his labour than when he plies his putting-net close inshore. The shrimper, when he captures a sufficient quantity, proceeds to boil them; and till they undergo that process they are not edible. The shrimp is “the ‘Undine’ of the waters,” and seems possessed by some aquatic devil, it darts about with such intense velocity. Like the lobster and the crab, the prawn periodically changes its skill; and its exertions to throw off its old clothes are really as wonderful as those of its larger relatives of the lobster and crab family. There are a great many species of shrimp in addition to the common one; as, for instance, banded, spinous, sculptured, three-spined, and two-spined. Young prawns, too, are often taken in the “putting-nets” and sold for shrimps. Prawns are caught in some places in pots resembling those used for the taking of lobsters. The prawn exuviates very frequently; in fact it has no sooner recovered from one illness than it has to undergo another. Although the prawn and the shrimp are exceedingly common on the British coasts, when we consider the millions of these “sea insects,” as they have been called, which are annually consumed at the breakfast tables and in the tea-gardens of London alone (not to speak of those which are greedily devoured in our watering-places, or the few which are allowed to reach the more inland towns of the country), we cannot but wonder where they all come from, or who provides them; and the problem can only be solved by taking into account the fact that we are surrounded by hundreds of miles of a productive seabord, and that thousands of seafaring people, and others as well, make it their business to supply such luxuries to all who can pay for them. It is even found profitable to send these delicacies to England all the way from the remote fisheries of Scotland.

The art of “shrimping” is well understood all round the English coasts. The mode of capturing this particular member of the Crustacea is by what is called a shrimp-net, formed of a frame of wood and twine into a long bag, which is used as a kind of minature trawl-net; each shrimping-boat being provided with one or two of these instruments, which, scraping along the sand, compel the shrimp to enter. Each boat is provided with a “well,” or store, to contain the proceeds of the nets, and on arrival at home the shrimps are immediately boiled for the London or other markets. The shrimpers are rather ill-used by the trade. Of the many thousand gallons sent daily to London, they only get an infinitesimal portion of the money produce. The retail price in London is four shillings per gallon, out of which the producer is understood to get only threepence! I have been told that the railways charge at the extraordinary rate of £9 a ton for the carriage of this delicacy to London. It is an interesting sight to watch the shrimpers at their work, and such of my readers as can obtain a brief holiday should run down to Leigh, or some nearer fishing place, where they can see the art of shrimping carried on in all its picturesque beauty.

The fresh-water cray-fish, a very delicate kind of miniature lobster, abundantly numerous in all our larger streams, and exceedingly plentiful in France, may often be seen on the counters of our fishmongers; as also the sea cray-fish, which is much larger in size, having been known to attain the weight of ten or twelve pounds, but it is coarser in the flavour than either the crab or lobster. The river cray-fish, which lodges in holes in the banks of our streams, is caught simply by means of a split stick with a bit of bait inserted at the end. The fresh-water cray-fish has afforded a better opportunity for studying the structure of the crustacea than any of the salt-water species, as its habits can be more easily observed. The sea cray-fish is not at all plentiful in the British Islands, although we have a limited supply in some of our markets.

There has hitherto been a fixed period for the annual sacrifice to crustacean gastronomy. As my readers are already aware, there is a well-known time for the supplying of oysters, which is fixed by law, and which begins in August and ends in April. During the r-less months oysters are less wholesome than in the colder weather. The season for lobsters begins about March, and is supposed to close with September, so that in the round of the year we have always some kind of shell-fish delicacy to feast upon. Were a little more attention devoted to the economy of our fisheries, we might have lobsters and crabs upon our tables all the year round. In my opinion lobsters are as good for food in the winter time as during the months in which they are most in demand. It may be hoped that we shall get to understand all this much better by and by, for at present we are sadly ignorant of the natural economy of these, and indeed all other denizens of the deep.

A new branch of shell-fishing has been lately revived in Scotland. I allude to the pearl-fisheries which are now being carried on in our large streams, and which, if prudently conducted, may become a source of considerable wealth to the Scottish people.

The pearl is found in a species of shell-fish which is a variety of the mussel, not an oyster, as is commonly supposed. The pearl has been pronounced the most beautiful of all our gems, coming, as it does, finished and perfect, direct from the laboratory of nature, and consequently owing nothing to the cunning of man except its discovery—

In the Eastern seas professional divers are employed to go down into the depths of the ocean in order to obtain them—a dangerous occupation, at one time only followed by condemned criminals. The best-known fishery for pearls is that at Ceylon, which was a very lucrative concern, at one time, in the hands of the industrious Dutch.

Pearls are of remote antiquity. In the time of Pliny they held the highest rank among all gems, and the Romans esteemed and largely used them—the ladies ornamenting, with lavish extravagance, all parts of their dress with them; and so extravagant did they become in their use of these gems by way of personal ornament, that Seneca, the wise moralist, reproaches a patrician by saying that his lady wore all the wealth of his house in her ears, it being at that time the fashion for a lady to have three or four of these valuable gems hung in each ear-drop. As to the value of these drops from the deep, we may instance Cleopatra’s banquet to Mark Antony, when, according to vulgar belief, she took a pearl from her ear, worth £80,000 of our money, and dissolving it in vinegar, swallowed it! The pearl which CÆsar presented to the mother of Marcus Brutus is said to have been of the value of £48,000. Then we are told that Clodius, the son of the tragedian, once swallowed a pearl worth £8000. Actors’ sons of the present day have been known to do extravagant things; but few of them, I suspect, could achieve a feat like this. In the East, too, in those early days, the pearl was held in the highest esteem. We read of one gem, still to be seen in Persia, I believe, that had a market price set upon it equal to £100,000 of our money; and there is another pearl mentioned as obtained in 1587 from the island of Margarita which weighed 250 carats, the value of which was named as being $150,000; and there are many other instances on record of the value of pearls to which I need not make further reference.

When our government took up the Eastern pearl-fishery in 1797, the annual produce was £144,000, which in the following year was increased by £50,000, but immediately afterwards fell off, most probably from overfishing. It revived again, and in the beginning of the present century the pearl ground was leased to private adventurers at the large rent of £120,000 per annum, with the wise understanding that the bed or bank was to be divided into portions, only one of which was to be worked at a time, so that a part of the mussels might have a good rest. From various causes, however, the Ceylon fisheries have again failed, and for a year or two have been totally unproductive. In a privately-printed work on Ceylon, by James Steuart, Esq. of Colpetty, which the author has kindly forwarded to me along with a quantity of Oriental pearl-oyster shells, there is a very interesting description of the Ceylon pearl-fishery, with notes on the natural history of the oyster. In reference to the recent failure of the fishery for gems in the Gulf of Manaar, Mr. Steuart has supplied me with the following interesting note:—

“The Gulf of Manaar pearl-fisheries having again ceased to be productive, the government of Ceylon appear to be impressed with a belief that further information is needed respecting the habits of the pearl-oyster, and that it may be desirable to obtain the services of a naturalist to study and report on the best means of insuring a continuous revenue from pearls.

“The natural history of the edible oyster is now so well understood that its culture on artificial beds is in successful progress in many places on the coasts of both England and France; but it is one thing to breed and fatten edible oysters for the palate, and another to breed the pearly mollusc of Ceylon to produce pearl.

“That which is commonly called the pearl-oyster of the Gulf of Manaar is classed by naturalists with the mussel in consequence of its shells being united by a broad hinge and its having a strong fibrous byssus with which it attaches itself to the shells of others, to rocks, and to other substances. It had long been believed that the fish in question had not the power of locomotion, nor of detaching its byssus from the substances to which it adhered; but in the year 1851 it was satisfactorily ascertained that when it had become detached it possessed the power of extending its body from within its shells and of creeping up the inner side of a glass globe containing sea-water. It was, however, left to the late Dr. Kelaart, when employed by government as a naturalist to study the habits of the fish, to discover that, although it could not detach its byssus from the rock to which it adhered, it had the power of casting off from its body its entire byssus and of proceeding to some other spot, and there, by forming a new byssus, of attaching itself to any substance near to it. It is therefore now believed that the Manaar pearl-fish has the power of changing its position, and this may account for the disappearance of large quantities from the sandy places on which the brood sometimes settles; but it is by no means so clear that these fish are able to drag their shells after them over the rugged surface of coral rocks.

“I have already stated that the produce of the pearl-fish of the Gulf of Manaar varies in richness of colour, in the size of the pearl, and the quantity of its yield, according to the nature of the ground on which it rests, or of the food which that ground supplies. In some cases the pearl produced barely repays the cost of fishing. It would therefore appear to be desirable that the component parts of the surface of the most productive banks should be subjected to chemical analysis. And as the natural history of the mussel and the scollop does not appear to be so well ascertained as that of the edible oyster, it might be attended by some useful result if a prize were offered for the best treatise on these European bivalves as being the nearest approach to the pearly mollusc of Ceylon. With the information thus obtained, it might not be necessary to incur the expense of sending a naturalist to Ceylon.”

During the past two or three summers the early industry of pearl-seeking has been very successfully revived in Scotland, chiefly through the exertions of Mr. Moritz Unger, a dealer in gems residing in Edinburgh. That gentleman having, in the way of his trade, occasionally fallen in with pearls said to be obtained in Scottish rivers, was so struck with their great beauty that he determined to set about their collection in a more systematic way. At that time there was in Scotland only one professed fisher for pearls, who lived at Killin, and whose stock was principally bought up by the late Marquis of Breadalbane. Mr. Unger, having in view the extension of the trade, travelled over the whole country, and announced his intention of buying, at a fixed scale of prices, all the pearls he could obtain—taking possession, in the meantime, of such gems as he could get from the peasantry, and paying them a liberal price. The consequence is, that now, instead of there being but one professed pearl-seeker in Scotland, there are hundreds who cling to pearl-fishing as their sole occupation, and, being sober and industrious men, they make a good living by it.

The Scotch pearls were, in the middle ages, celebrated all over Europe for their size and beauty. Just one hundred years ago—between the years 1761 and 1764—pearls to the value of £10,000 were sent to London from the rivers Tay and Isla; but the trade carried on in the corresponding years of this century is far more than double that amount. Mr. Unger estimates the pearls found last summer (1864) to be of the value to the finders of about £10,000; whereas, on his first tour, he bought up, four years ago, all that were to be had for the sum of £40. Single specimens have recently been found worth as much as £60.

From the middle of last century till about 1860 the Scottish pearl-fisheries were quite neglected, and large pearls were found only as it were by accident in occasional dry seasons, when the rivers were scant of water, and the mussels were consequently accessible without much trouble. It was left for Mr. Unger to discern the capabilities of the Scottish pearl as an ornamental gem of great value; and it is now a fact that the beautiful pink-hued pearls of our Scottish streams are admired even beyond the Oriental pearls of Ceylon. The Empress Eugenie, Queen Victoria, and other royal ladies, as well as many of the nobility, have been making large purchases of these Scottish gems. In some rural districts the peasantry are making little fortunes by pearl-seeking for only a few hours a day. Many of the undemonstrative weavers and cobblers, whose residence is near a pearl-producing stream, contrive, in the early morning, or after the usual day’s work, to step out and gather a few hundreds of the pearl-containing mussels, in which they are almost sure to find a few gems of more or less value. The pearl-fisher requires no capital to set him up in his trade; he needs no costly instruments, but has only to wade into the stream, put forth his hand, and gather what he finds.

An intelligent pearl-fisher, who resides near the river Doon, has sent me the following graphic account of what he calls “the pearl fever:”—“For many years back the boys were in the habit of amusing themselves in the summer-time, when the water was shallow, by gathering mussels and searching them for pearls, having heard somehow that money could be obtained for them; but they often enough found that, however difficult it might be to secure the pearl, it was still more difficult to get it converted into cash—threepence, sixpence, or a shilling, being the ordinary run of prices, buyers and sellers being alike ignorant of the commodity in which they were dealing. It was not until the middle of the summer of 1863 that the fever of pearl-seeking broke out thoroughly on the banks of the classic Doon. The weather had been uncommonly dry for some time, and the river had in many places become extremely shallow; some of the women and children had been employing their spare time in gathering mussels and opening them, and few of those who had given it a trial failed to become the possessors of one or more pearls. Just then Mr. Unger made his appearance, and bought up all he could get at prices which perfectly startled the people; and, as a consequence, young and old, male and female, rushed like ducks to the water, and waded, dived, and swam, till the excitement became so intense as to be called by many the ‘pearl fever.’ The banks of the river for some time presented an extraordinary scene. Here a solitary female, very lightly clad indeed, is seen wading up to the breast, and as she stoops to pick up a mussel, her head is of necessity immersed in the water. Having got hold of a shell she throws it on to the opposite bank and stoops for another, and in this manner secures as many as her apron will hold, and carries them home to find that, very likely, she has more blanks than prizes among them. There, in a shallow part of the stream, a swarm of boys are trying their fortune; there is a great degree of impatience in their mode of fishing, for each shell is opened and examined so soon as it is lifted. A little above them are two scantily-clad females earnestly at work; one of them is actually stone blind, but she gropes with her naked feet for a shell, then picks it up with her hand, carefully opens it with a stout knife, and with her thumb feels every part of its interior. She has been pretty successful, and her tidy dress when she is resting from her labour betokens the good use she makes of the proceeds of her fishing. The spectator may next pass through the crowds of men, women, and boys similarly employed, where the grassy banks are reddened by the constant tread of many feet, and the smell of heaps upon heaps of putrid mussels tells the magnitude of the slaughter. The eye is then attracted by the sight of a man on crutches making for the river. He soon gets seated on the right bank of the stream, where his better half, in water almost beyond her depth, is gathering from the bottom of the muddy and all but stagnant part of the river a quantity of shells for him to examine. Nor were the labours of this couple unrewarded; by their united exertions they earned in a few weeks somewhat above £8, and so little idea had they of the value of the pearls, that on one occasion when they expected about 15s. for a few they had despatched to the collector, they were agreeably surprised at the receipt of three times the amount by return of post. It was found that the fishing was most successful where the river was deep and its motion sluggish. To get at the mussels in such places, large iron rakes, with long teeth and handles about twenty feet in length, were procured, and by means of these some of the deepest parts of the river were dragged and some valuable pearls secured; many of which were disposed of at £1 each, others at 25s., and one at £2; while a great number ranged from 7s. 6d. to 15s. each. But by far the greater portion were either entirely useless, or on account of their smallness, bad shape, or colour, were parted with for a mere trifle. Some idea of the extent of the pearl-fishery in 1863 of this one river may be gathered from the fact that Mr. Unger paid to those engaged in it a sum exceeding £150 for each month the fishing lasted; and a goodly number of pearls were disposed of to private individuals in the vicinity for their own special use, besides those that found their way into the markets. During the continuance of the fishery the general cry was that so much exposure of the body was likely to introduce a variety of diseases such as had not hitherto been known in the place; but no such effects made their appearance. And though there were exceptional cases where the extra cash (for it was like found money) obtained for the pearls was worse than wasted, there are many who can point to a new suit of clothes or a good lever watch, when asked what they had to show as the reward of the many cold drenchings they got while dredging the Doon for pearls.”

In 1863 a controversy arose as to which rivers produced the best pearls, and it was then argued that only in those streams issuing from lochs was a continuous supply of the pearl-mussel to be found, and although there are a few pearl streams which take their rise in some little spring and gather volume as they flow, yet their number, as far as is known, is only four—viz. the Ugie, Ythan, Don, and Isla—and even these are now (1865) very nearly exhausted. Many of the finest gems have been found in the Doon, Teith, Forth, Earn, Tay, Lyon, Spey, Conan, etc. etc. Until this summer (1865) it has been supposed that the lochs are the natural reservoirs of the pearl-mussel, and when in 1860-1 a portion of Loch Venachar was laid dry for the purpose of building a sluice for the Glasgow Waterworks, innumerable shells were found, from which the labourers gathered a great many very fine pearls. The above theory was thereby so much confirmed that Mr. Unger was induced in 1864 to try further experiments on Lochs Venachar, Achray, and Lubnaig, by means of dredging, which, considering the rough mode of procedure, was so successful, especially on a place called Lynn Achore, at the east end of Loch Venachar, that he at last considered himself justified in incurring considerable expense. Accordingly he procured this summer (1865) one of Siebes’ diving apparatus, and bringing down one of the best divers from London, proceeded to search the bottoms of several lochs on a systematic plan. Many obstacles were thrown in Mr. Unger’s way by the proprietors, and although he was particularly anxious to experiment on Loch Tay, the present Earl of Breadalbane would not grant permission for him to do so. But with the consent of the Earl of Moray the first regular trial was made on Loch Venachar, and it was ascertained beyond a doubt that shells were to be found in all the sandy shallow parts of the loch; not however in beds, as people were led to suppose from dredging experiments, but only here and there in clusters of a dozen or so, except at the mouth of the loch, where they were more extensive and in larger quantities. The diver also went down in various parts of the loch to the depth of a hundred feet, where it was found to be quite impracticable to search for anything so small as a pearl-mussel on account of the thick muddy bottom. Mr. Unger, nothing daunted by this partial failure, went to Sir Robert Menzies, who not only consented at once to his trying Loch Rannoch, but generously placed all available boats and utensils, besides the service of several men, at his disposal; after a week’s trial, however, Mr. Unger was reluctantly compelled for the present to desist from any further experiments.

Pearls are found in many of the Irish and Welsh rivers, and Mr. Unger now receives constant accessions to his stock from the north of Ireland. The Conway was noted for pearls in the days of Camden. The pearl-mussels are called by the Welsh “Deluge shells,” and are thought by the ignorant to have been left by the Flood. The river Irt, in Cumberland, was also at one time a famous stream for pearls; and during last century several pearls were found in the streams of Ireland, particularly in the counties of Tyrone and Donegal. We read of specimens that fetched sums varying from £4 to £80.

If my readers be curious to know how many shells will have to be opened before this toil is rewarded with a find of pearls, let them be told that, on the average, the searcher never opens a hundred mussels without being made happy with a few of the gems. It is remarked that they are more certain to have pearls when they are taken from the stony places of the river. Thousands of mussels have been found in the sand, but these have rarely if ever contained a single pearl; whilst the shells again that are found in soft and muddy bottoms have plenty of gems, but they are poor in quality and bad in colour. No pearls are ever found in a young shell, and all such may at once be rejected. A skilful operator opens the mussel with a shell, in order to avoid scratching the pearl; the opened fish is thrown into the water, and it is either the mussels or the insects gathering about them that are greedily devoured by the salmon and other fish, so that those proprietors of streams who were becoming uneasy as to the effects of the pearl-fishery on the salmon may set their minds at rest. Although at one time none of the London dealers in gems would look at a Scotch pearl, it is an interesting fact that now the fame of the Scottish fisheries has so extended as to bring buyers from France and other Continental countries; and, as boats and dredges are now being introduced, it is thought that any moderate demand may be supplied. Great quantities of pearls have been sent to the collector through the post-office.

An Ayrshire paper says of the Doon fishery:—“That owing to the wholesale slaughter of the mussels last season, the pearl-fishing this summer (1864) in the river Doon has been neither so exciting nor remunerative. Few have paid much attention to it; but even amongst those few rather more than £100 has been obtained for pearls since the month of May, there being more than one individual who has earned at least £13 during that period, having followed their avocation daily, whilst the pearl-fishing was engaged in as a profitable recreation. As a whole the pearls of the river Doon are of an inferior quality, £2 being about the highest price at which any of them have been sold; these weighed from eight to twelve grains, but were far from being very bright in colour. ‘It is all a matter of chance,’ say some of the pearl-fishers; ‘you may fish a whole day and not make sixpence, and one worth a pound may be, yea has been, found in the second shell.’” Such things have frequently happened, but the earnest plodding fisher has always been handsomely paid for his work. Though on an average a pearl is found in every thirty shells, only one pearl in every ten is fit for the market. It will thus be seen that one hundred and thirty shells have to be gathered, opened, and examined, and one hundred and thirty lives sacrificed, in order to secure one marketable pearl.[16]

It is not unlikely that the present mania for pearl-gathering may very speedily exhaust the supply of mussels. The energy with which the fishing is carried on undoubtedly points to a very speedy diminution of a shell-fish which was never very plentiful, and it would be a very good plan to try the system of culture on hurdles which has been found so successful for the growth of the edible mussel of the Bay of Aiguillon, to be now described.

Considering the importance attached by fishermen to the easy attainment of a cheap supply of bait, it is surprising that no attempt has been made in this country to economise and regulate the various mussel-beds which abound on the Scottish and English coasts. The mussel is very largely used for bait, and fishermen have to go far, and pay dear, for what they require—their wives and families being also employed to gather as many as they can possibly procure on the accessible places of the coast, but usually the bait has to be purchased and carried from long distances. I propose to show our fisher-people how these matters are managed in France, and how they may obviate the labour and expense connected with bait buying or gathering, by growing such a crop of mussels as would not only suffice for an abundant supply of bait, but produce a large quantity for sale as well.

Mussel-culture has been carried on with immense success on a certain part of the coast of France for a period of no less than seven centuries! So long ago as the year of grace 1135 an Irish barque was wrecked in the Bay of Aiguillon. The cargo and one of the crew were saved by the humanity of the fishermen inhabiting the coast. The name of the one man who was thus saved from shipwreck was Walton, and he gave to the people, in gratitude for saving his life, the germ of a marvellous fish-breeding idea. He invented artificial mussel-culture. An exile from Erin, Walton was ingenious enough to create a “hurdle,” which, intercepting the spat of the mussels, served as a place for them to grow. In a sense, the origin of this mussel-farm was accidental. The bay where this industry is now flourishing was, at the time of the shipwreck, and is at present, a vast expanse of mud, frequented by sea-fowl, and it was while devising a kind of net or trap for the capture of these that he obtained the germ of his future idea of mussel-culture. The net or bag-trap which he employed in catching the night birds which floated on the water was fixed in the mud by means of tolerably strong supports, and he soon found out that the parts of his net which were sunk in the water had intercepted large quantities of mussel-spat, which in time grew into the finest possible mussels, larger in size and finer in quality than those grown upon the neighbouring mud. From less to more this simple discovery progressed into a regular industry, which at present forms almost the sole occupation of the inhabitants of the neighbouring shores. The system pursued is that invented by Walton about the middle of the twelfth century, and has been handed down from generation to generation in all its original simplicity and ingenuity. The apparatus for the growth of the mussel, with which the bay is now almost covered, is called a bouchot, and is of very simple construction. A number of strong piles or stakes, each 12 feet in length and 6 inches in diameter, are driven into the mud to the depth of 6 feet, at a distance of about 2 feet from each other, and are ranged in two converging rows, so as to form a V, the sharp point of which is always turned towards the sea, that the stakes may offer the least possible resistance to the waves. These two rows form the framework of the bouchot. Strong branches of trees are then twisted and interwoven into the upper part of the stakes, which are 6 feet in height, until the whole length of the row is, by this species of basket-work on a large scale, formed into a strong fence or palisade. A space of a few inches is left between the bottom of the fence and the surface of the mud, to allow the water to pass freely between the stakes when the tide ebbs and flows. The sides of the bouchot are from 200 to 250 metres long, and each bouchot, therefore, forms a fence of about 450 metres, 6 feet high. There are now some 500 of these bouchots or breeding-grounds in the Bay of Aiguillon, making a fence of 225,000 metres, extending over a space of 8 kilometres, or 5 miles, from the point of St. Clemens to the mouth of the river of Marans.

The Bay of Aiguillon, as has already been observed, is a vast field of mud, and, when left dry at low water, it is impassable on foot. To enable him to traverse it at low water, the boucholeur uses a canoe. This canoe, formed of plain planks of wood, is about nine feet in length and eighteen inches in breadth and depth, the fore-end being something like the usual shape of the bow of a boat. The boucholeur places himself at the stern of the canoe, rests his right knee on the bottom of the boat, leans his body forward, and, seizing the two sides of the canoe with his hands, throws out his left leg, which is encased in a strong boot, backwards to serve as an oar. In this position he pushes his left leg in and out of the mud, and thus propels his light boat along the surface to whatever part of the field he wishes to visit. Notwithstanding the windings and twistings of the confused maze formed on the surface of the bay by the bouchots, long habit enables the boucholeur, even in the darkest night, to distinguish his neighbour’s establishment in the crowd. The boucholeur uses his canoe not only in transporting his mussels from the bouchot to the shore, and attending to the various operations of the mussel-field, but also in conveying to the proper spot the stakes and hurdles necessary for the construction and repair of the bouchots. The furrows left by the canoe in the mud might, in the summer time, by hardening in the sun, render the propulsion of his canoe across the field a very arduous task to the boucholeur. Nature has, however, provided an admirable remedy for this possible evil. A small crustacean, the corophie, appears in great numbers in the mud-field about the end of the month of April, and during the summer months levels and overturns many leagues of these furrows, and mixes the mud with water, in searching after the innumerable multitudes of worms (annelidÆ) of all species that infest the mud. The corophies, which are remarkably fond of these marine worms, pursue them in every direction through the mud; and, by their vigorous efforts to discover their prey, prevent the furrows from forming an obstacle to the progress of the boucholeur. This crustacean disappears suddenly, in a single night, towards the end of October.

The cultivation of mussels is carried on by the inhabitants of the communes of Esnandes, Chavron, and Marsilly. Many of the boucholeurs possess several bouchots, while the poorest of them have only a share of one bouchot, cultivating it, together with the other owners, and dividing the profits among them, according to their shares. The bouchots are arranged in four divisions, according to their position in the bay, and are distinguished as bouchots du bas or d’aval, bouchots batard, bouchots milieu, and bouchots d’avant. The bouchots du bas, placed farthest from the shore, and only uncovered during spring tides, are not formed of fences as the bouchots proper, but consist simply of a row of stakes, planted about one boat distant from each other, and in the most favourable position for the preservation of the naissain, or young of the mussels. Upon these isolated stakes the spat is allowed to collect, which is afterwards to be transplanted for the purpose of peopling barren or poorly-furnished palisades in those divisions which, planted nearer the shore, are more frequently uncovered by the tide.

The various operations of mussel-cultivation are designated by agricultural terms—such as sowing, planting, transplanting, etc. Towards the end of April the seed (semence) fixed during February and March to the stakes of the bouchot du bas is about the size of a grain of flax, and is then called naissain. By the month of July it attains the size of a bean, and is called renouvelain, and is then ready for transplantation to a less favourable state of existence upon the bouchot batard, where the action of the tide would probably have retarded its growth if transplanted earlier. In the month of July, then, the boucholeurs direct their canoes towards the isolated stakes, bearing the semence, now developed into the renouvelain, which they detach by means of a hook fixed to the end of a pole. Care is taken to gather such a quantity as they are able to transplant during low water—the only time when this operation can be carried on. The semence, placed in baskets, is transported by means of the canoe to the fences of the bouchot batard. The operation of fixing the renouvelain upon the palisades of the bouchot batard is called la batrisse. The semence, enclosed in bags of old net, is placed in all the empty spaces along the palisades until the hurdles are quite covered, sufficient space being left between the bags to admit of the growth of the young mussels. The bags soon rot and fall to pieces, leaving the young mussels adhering to the sides of the bouchot. The mussels by and by attain a large size, and grow so close to each other that the whole fence looks like a wall blackened by fire.

When the mussels grow so large that they touch and overlap each other, the cultivator thins the too-crowded ranks of the bouchots batard, in order to make way for a younger generation of mussels. The mussels thus obtained are transplanted and placed on the empty or partially-covered hurdles, and transplanted to the bouchot milieu, which is uncovered during neap-tides. This operation is performed in the manner already described, only the larger size of the mussels renders the use of a net to enclose them unnecessary. The labour of transplanting is continued so long as there remain upon the bouchot du bas any renouvelain fit for being placed on the bouchots nearer the shore. The work must be carried on at all times of the day and night during low water, as that is the only period that the bouchots are uncovered. There is also the labour of replacing and covering with mussels any of the palisades that may have sunk or been broken.

After about a year’s sojourn on these artificial beds the mussels are fit for the market. Before being ready for sale, they are transplanted to the buchots d’avant, which are placed close to the shore to admit of the mussels being easily gathered by the hand when ready for the market. A very perceptible difference in quality is seen in the mussels grown on different parts of the bay—those of the upper division possessing the finest flavour, while those of the lower divisions are much inferior, a circumstance caused no doubt by their suffering much more from the influence of the wind.

The mussel has become, by its abundance and cheapness, the daily food of the poorer classes, and sells well throughout the year. It is, however, only in season from the month of July till the end of January, and it is during that period that the most important operations of the farmer are carried on, and that the great part of the harvest is sent to the market. During the spawning season, which lasts from the end of February to the end of April, they lose their good flavour and become meagre and tough.

At the foot of the cliffs, along the shores, the boucholeurs dig large holes for the purpose of storing their implements of labour. When a supply of mussels is required for a neighbouring market the boucholeurs bring them in their canoes to the landing-place, whence they are conveyed by the wives to these stores, where they are cleared and packed in hampers and baskets, which are placed upon the backs of horses or in carts, and driven during the night to the place of destination, which is reached in good time for the opening of the market in the morning. About 140 horses and 90 carts are employed for the purpose of thus supplying the neighbouring towns and villages.

A well-peopled bouchot usually yields, according to the length of its sides, from 400 to 500 loads of mussels—that is at the rate of a load per metre. A load weighs 150 kilogrammes (about 3 cwts.), and sells for 5 francs. A single bouchot, therefore, bears about 60,000 or 75,000 kilogrammes annually in weight, of the value of from 2000 to 2500 francs. The whole harvest of these bouchots would therefore weigh from 30 to 35 millions of kilogrammes, which would yield a revenue of something like a million francs.

I hope this plan of mussel-culture will speedily be adopted on our own coasts; it would be a saving of both time and money to the fishermen, who cannot do without bait in large quantities, seeing that the number of hooks required for the line-fishing has so largely increased during late years. The procuring of the necessary quantity of mussels is sometimes impossible; and when that is the case the men cannot proceed to the fishing, but have to remain at home in forced idleness till the bait can be obtained. This plan of growing the mussels might be easily adopted by our fisher-folks, whom it is now my province to describe.