And when breakfast was over and he had dried the dishes, there were so many things he wanted to ask the captain about. All that he had learned about oyster-culture was so interesting it made him want to learn more. And by this time he realized that there was much, much more to know.
"Captain Bagley," said Alec, when the Bertha B was fairly under way, "the pier watchman was telling me that the oystermen spread old shells over their oyster-beds for the young oysters to attach themselves to. How can oysters move about in the water? I should think their shells would keep them on the bottom, even though they are very small. Why, a grain of sand can't float, and see how much smaller that is than an oyster."
"Yes. It's smaller than a grown oyster, but many times as large as a brand-new oyster. And besides, oysters just born don't have any shells."
Alec looked sharply at the captain, but could not detect the faintest twinkle in his eye. "Honest?" he asked. "You're not stringing me?"
"Not a bit of it, son. Why, a new-born oyster is so small you can't even see it."
"Now I know you're teasing me."
"Indeed, I am not. You have to have a microscope to see an oyster that has just been born. They have to be very small, for a single oyster gives birth to millions of little ones. These don't have no shells at all. And then the tide sweeps 'em in and out, so I reckon they get scattered pretty much everywhere in the neighborhood of the oyster-beds."
"But how do they grow fast to old shells and other oysters if they have no shells themselves?"
"Oh! They get shells quick enough. And as soon as they do, they sink to the bottom and fasten themselves to the first clean rock or shell they come to. If they don't hit a rock or shell, they sink in the mud and die. Of course, there ain't no rocks on our mud bottom, and that's why we have to put shells on the beds. And we no sooner get the bed covered with shells than we have to scrub 'em, to get the mud off of 'em."