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Updated: June 18, 2025
The produce of the warren, of the oyster-bed, several turtles which were taken, excellent salmon which came up the Mercy, vegetables from the plateau, wild fruit from the forest, were riches upon riches, and Neb, the head cook, could scarcely by himself store them away.
At last, Socrates suggested the burning of oyster-shells, and by dint of fishing a good deal, among the channels of the reef, a noble oyster-bed was found, and the boats brought in enough of the shells to furnish as much lime as would put up a chimney for the kitchen; one apartment for that sort of work being made, as yet, to suffice for the wants of all who dwelt in Eden.
The boat's sails were set, and under whole canvas we pushed off on our way to the oyster-bed; for the craving for wealth was upon us all, and we felt that every moment spent otherwise than in gathering it was so much wasted time.
Among these are met with in many places beds of a great oyster, now unknown in life. I cannot say whether there are any here; but at Reading, to the east of Farnham, at Croydon, and under London, they are abundant. There must have been miles and miles of oyster-bed at the bottom of that Eocene sea; among the oyster-beds, beds of a peculiar pebble, which we shall see in our gravel-pit.
The oyster-bed among the rocks was frequently renewed and furnished excellent molluscs. Besides that, the fishing, either in the lake or the Mercy, was very profitable, for Pencroft had made some lines, armed with iron hooks, with which they frequently caught fine trout, and a species of fish whose silvery sides were speckled with yellow, and which were also extremely savory.
Because the drill prefers the thin-shelled mussel to the thicker-shelled oyster it has been suggested that mussels should be planted outside oyster-beds, so that the drills would stay there. But the cure would be worse than the disease, for the mussels would spread over the oyster-bed and the drills with them, since they would have so excellent a breeding ground.
For whereas when we had last visited the oyster-bed the process of putrefaction had only just begun, it had now advanced so far that the fish were not only completely decayed but had also in many cases so completely dried up under the influence of the sun's rays as to have, to a very great extent, lost their odour.
And the winds of adventure blew the oyster pirate sloops up and down San Francisco Bay, from raided oyster-beds and fights at night on shoal and flat, to markets in the morning against city wharves, where peddlers and saloon-keepers came down to buy. Every raid on an oyster-bed was a felony. The penalty was State imprisonment, the stripes and the lockstep. And what of that?
Grace Hartley accompanied us from the boat to the oyster-bed, and remained long enough to actually find for herself two very fine pearls; but that sufficed. She confessed that the effluvium was altogether too powerful for her, and beat a hasty retreat to the boat, where she spent the remainder of the day in comparative comfort, only an occasional faint whiff of odour reaching her there.
The inhabitants of New Brunswick have noticed that "ice will not form over an oyster-bed, unless the cold is very intense indeed; and when the bays are frozen over, the oyster-beds are easily discovered by the water above them remaining unfrozen, or, as the French residents say, degèle." Our host said that they kept them in cellars all winter. "Without anything to eat or drink?" I asked.
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