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WHERE the St. Michael and Choptank Rivers placidly flow into the Chesapeake Bay, and in the deep recesses of Tangier and Pocomoke Sounds, along the eastern shore of Maryland, hundreds of canoes and bateaus now ply the waters, manned by sturdy fishermen; for the oyster season, one of Maryland's greatest industries, has begun.

When September, the first month of the "r" is ushered in, the innumerable pleasure crafts which have plied these same waters from May until August, seek their winter moorings and give way entirely to the less ostentatious but more business-like fishing boats.

The method of taking the oyster from its home in the depths is interesting. Although the Tangier and Pocomoke Sounds and Choptank and St. Michael Rivers are favorite grounds for oystering in Maryland, the industry is extensively carried on throughout the lower Chesapeake Bay and rivers tributary thereto. Hundreds of sloops and small boats ply the waters, some anchored and some under slow motion, and these comprise the famous Maryland Oyster Navy.

The small craft, such as canoes and bateaus, are manned by two or more fishermen, who make a business of oystering eight months of the year. These men are known as "tongers." Their implements consists of a pair of "tongs," similar in appearance to two hay rakes, with the prongs facing, fastened to poles ranging from 15 to 24 feet in length. Each pair of tongs require two persons to manipulate them. The size of the catch depends upon the strength of

the tongers. When the oysterman locates his fishing ground, he anchors his canoe and the great tongs are immersed to the bed of the river. The handles are forced apart and the two men manipulating them push forward toward each other, closing the prongs of the tongs together, scraping up the oysters on the bed. Then the tongs are lifted and contents dumped into what is called a "culling board." The culling board is very similar to a sieve, the apertures of which being about two and a half inches in diameter, the regulation requirement by law. All of the oysters which do not fall through the apertures are placed in the boat, while those which pass through the meshes are thrown back into the water.

When the canoes and bateaus are filled to their capacity, the fishermen take their cargo and dispose of it to the nearest "pungy." A pungy is a large sloop, which anchors in the midst of an oyster fleet and receives the cargo of the smaller craft. While there are many firms which hire regularly a number of the fishermen in small craft to work for them alone, yet there are numbers of "free-booters," who gather their wares and sell for the best price. When a pungy has its full load, it proceeds at once to Baltimore, from which point they are shipped throughout the United States.

While tonging is the initiative method of oystering, it does not continue extensively when the extreme cold weather sets in, and then it is that dredging is the process most generally pursued. An oyster dredger commonly consists of a sloop, which is provided with two dredging machines in the center of the boat, one on

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each side. Each machine requires four to five men to operate it, and consists of a pair of heavy steel tongs three feet in width, supplemented at the back with a large wire basket, so that the oysters which are grappled rapidly by the tongs are forced back into the wire basket by the motion of the boat, which is under sail. When the basket is filled it is brought to the surface by means of a windlass and the contents disposed of on the culling board. The culling process is then gone through with the same as in the small boats.

The laws governing tonging and dredging are very strict, and as the fishing grounds for each method are separated, a heavy fine is imposed for the trespassing of one up

on the other.

The life of the oysterman is anything but an easy one. Many of the men who ply their business at oystering in winter, work at truck gardening in the summer time. If the man is going into the business as a tonger he is required to pay a license of $3.75 for the season. This license he is required to have with him and show to any Government official who demands it before he can enter the oyster fields, as the territory for

the culling board. Should the oysterman's cargo consist of more than 5% of small oysters, he is fined accordingly and possibly subjected to imprisonment as the case merits.

The oyster was known to the Indians as a sea food long before Columbus discovered the new world, and they were adepts in catching them. The oysters were a commodity of trade between the coast Indians and those living farther back in the interior.

It is not to be supposed, however, that oyster beds naturally grow from year to year supplying the endless demands. Their sources of supply are natural beds, planting and farming. Oyster planting consists of placing the young seed oysters upon bottoms favorable for their growth. Oyster farming is the rearing of oysters from the egg. The natural bed is an oyster rock. In such a bed it will be found that most of the rock is made up of empty shells. The oysters grow vertically side by side, and the closeness is often so great that the growth of one oyster prevents adjacent ones from opening their shells and thus crowding each other out, they die. The most prolific beds for young oysters are the spaces intervening between the oyster rocks. For miles and miles along the edge of the shore can be found these oyster rocks, but between these beds there are areas where not a single oyster is to be found, and it is this barren area which is best adapted for oyster farming. After a few bushels of shells are scattered upon these areas they are soon covered with young, and in several years a new oyster rock is found.

oystering in Maryland is confined to certain limits. The man who hires himself out as a dredger receives anywhere from $20.00 to $30.00 per month for his services. He is generally hired by the captain of a sloop, who pays a dredger's license of $2.85 gross per ton. As the law governing the size of oysters which are marketable is a very strict one, a state inspector examines every load, and fishermen are allowed 5% of their cargo for such small oysters as they have on board which have not slipped through

The waters for miles around the natural