3. Holstein Oysters are very good and fine, but the sea-banks do not afford enough for the present consumption, so that it is necessary to have good connexions in order to obtain real and good Holstein oysters. They are easily distinguished from all the other oysters by their size, the thin, greenish-blue shells, especially the lower shell. The upper shell is always concave, by which they are the more easily distinguished from the Heligolanders, which have always a strong convex upper shell. As to the little animal itself, it is very fat, white, thick, and tender, and therefore very digestible. It has only a small beard, by which it is distinguished from the Norwegian and Scottish oyster, which, by the appearance of the shell, might be mistaken for the Holstein oyster by novices in gastronomy. These delicate favourites are to be obtained from the lessees of the Royal Oyster-banks on the western coast of Holstein in Flensburg, in the kingdom of Denmark.
4. The Schleswick Oyster of Husum and Silt is very like the former—almost undistinguishable. It is very excellent, but seldom exported, and consumed for the most part in Kiel. The two last-named oysters are often taken to St. Petersburg by sailors, when making the passage to and fro.
5. The Heligolanders are very large; have thick shells, which renders the duty and carriage very high, but are not at all fine, and generally sold in all the innocence of ignorance by dealers as Holstein oysters.
Have nothing to do with Norwegian oysters; I only mention them here as things to be shunned. Bremer oysters, the Neuwerkers, and the Wangerogers, however, deserve a better fate.
6. The Oyster of the Bay of Biscay is of the same size as that of Holstein, with a very large beard, like those caught in the south of England. The beard, like the oyster itself, is quite grass green—a quality which is to be found generally only with oysters from Dieppe, Cancale, and the Marennes. Its flavour is very fine and good, but great care must be taken, in opening the shell and detaching the oyster, not to break the double shell, which they mostly possess, for this contains sulphuretted hydrogen, which gives a bad smell and flavour to the oyster, and poisons the stomach of the consumer.
7. American Oysters, though, to my taste, by no means so delicate as others I have mentioned, are nevertheless superior for cooking. For my own part, although I have stated that pepper, vinegar, lemon juice, and other stimulating ingredients, are commonly made use of when eating the oyster, I offer, in all courtesy, the decided opinion, that the taste must be vitiated that can swallow such in preference to the delicate, fresh, luscious, charming little morsel, saturated merely, or perhaps the word ought to be merely bedewed, like the rose on a summer morning, by its own liquid life's blood. Americans, themselves, generally prefer their large oysters even to our British Natives.
8. French Oysters.—The French oysters are chiefly taken from beds in the Bays of Cancale and St. Brieux, from Marennes, from Havre and Dieppe, from Dunkirk, and from the Bay of Biscay. The three first are very fine, but the distance to Paris is too great; they are therefore dear in that capital. Those from Dunkirk are similar to those of Ostend, but not quite so fine; and those from the Bay of Biscay are quite green, and highly esteemed in the south of France, especially at Bordeaux.
9. Dutch Oysters are both good and dear. The four sorts I recommend are Seelanders, Vliessingers, Middleburgers, and Vieringers. The latter are almost the finest and best, but uncommonly dear, and are mostly consumed in Holland.
10. Mediterranean Oysters.—I have already referred to classical authorities for the character the ancients gave those of Circe and the Lucrine Sea; and the old rule, "de mortius nil," forbids me to say in what rank I place Horace the inimitable, Seneca the wise, and Pliny the naturalist, as judges of what an oyster should be. Where ignorance is bliss, people can be very happy. Till the Turk, by an accidental fire, had become acquainted with the taste of roast pork, there were many less fires in Stamboul than now. Till the Romans found the Rutupians, the Lucrine flourished; so did Circe.