BRITISH OYSTERS: OLD AND NEW.
187
to A.D. 1850, the loss caused by want of system in collecting,
and by over-dredging, has led to the depletion and exhaustion
of many of the most productive oyster-beds; and the subsequent
re-stocking of most of those on the south coast of Hants and
Sussex, and elsewhere, has largely altered the original fauna by
the introduction of other types.
That the oyster beds were occasionally looked after in earlier
times is shown by an entry in The Ledger Book of the Bailiffs
at Newport, in the Isle of Wight, made in Queen Elizabeth's
days, 1567 et seq. which orders that no person was to be allowed
"to dragge for oysters wyhn the haven off the toun," without
a licence from the bailiffs under penalty of 2/6, and they were
to be sold in the market, "a hundred told by syx skore for ijd.
and no derer." Great oysters gathered by hand for iiijd. Every
boat owner had yearly "to gadre in the sea at large a bote full
of Oystrys called ffoye, and put the said ffoye yn the haven off
the Toun in the sight of the. bayllyfs or their Sergeauntes," under
penalty of 3/6.1
On the west coast of Scotland, Professors Kerr and Gregory,
of Glasgow University, tell me that I must not depend upon the
purity of descent of the more recent shells. Yet this locality
was once rich. Costa (The British Conchology, 1778, p. 161)
says: "The bays of W. Scotland afford great plenty. In the
Isle of Wacksay growing so big that they must be cut into four
pieces to be eaten." Dr. Wallace in his book on the Orkneys,
p. 42, also says that the largest oysters he had ever seen are got
in some places near the Orkneys, requiring the same treatment.
Loch Fyne, Oban, and Luce Bay to this day yield a few native
shells of large size, as does Colintraive in the Kyles of Bute;
but with the exception of Loch Ryan and Loch Tarbert, where
they are commercially cultivated, there is no oyster-fishing now
carried on.
At one time the oyster beds in the Firth of Forth extended
for 20 miles, from Mercera to Cockenzie. Dr. Wemyss Fulton,
in his report on the past and present condition of the oyster
beds in the Firth, 1895, says that in 1865 the Newhaven fisher-
men took millions of oysters from the Firth, but by 1882 the
supply had so greatly fallen off that dredging was actually given
up. They have now become so scarce that I have had much
1 Antiquary, vol. 48, p. 81, 1912.