Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 52, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 September 1876 — The Moral Character of the Oyster. [ARTICLE]

The Moral Character of the Oyster.

With the first day of Septeml>er the oyster comes again into favor and flavor, and as he is to associate with the men ana women of this land upon terms of the closest intimacy during the whole of the next eight months, it is worth while perhaps to inquire respecting his condition of life and his moral character. As to his fortune, a punster has already said of him that his case is moat uncommonly hard; that it is his, peaceful as he is, to perish in many a foreign broil; and it may be added that he is often in hot water, and perpetually in a stew of one kind or another. In temper he is even mild to placidity, although he is sometimes slightly ruffled, on his edges at least. He is quiet always, and usually very well-behaving; and yet he participates in nearly every scene of debauch and revelry. He frequents midnight suppers, and is the companion—the bosom companion we may say—of wild fellows of every degree. Ho makes no noise, and does no quarreling, but he is present in well nigh every riotous company, and is found at table with wines and liquors of every kind, name and quality. In himself, and so far as his personal behavior is concerned, the oyster is perfectly respectable, and gentlemen and gentlewomen have him at dinner without scruple; but there can be no doubt that his name is suggestive of dissoluteness and dissipation, precisely as the horse, noble as he is, is indissolubly associated in our minds with certain forms of knavery and with jockeyism “ in all its branches,” as the street signs say. Dickens, we believe it was, who pointed out the fact that the moment that any man falls into the poverty which comes of drunkenness and idleness he begins to eat oysters as a regular diet, and notwithstanding the high estimation in which the best of us hold this mollusk, his name somehow suggests irregularity of living, late hours, unwholesome haunts and potations of gin. Nevertheless he is a fine fellow, and we cannot spare him from the list of friends whom we are always glad to see at dinner. There is a placidity m his bearing, a decorum in his conduct which gives us confidence in him, and wherever ho is met he is sure of a hearty welcome.— JSf. T. Evening Poet.