• THE HISTORY OF FISH-CULTURE. 471 



speak of sumptuous tables spread with these exclusively. In the period 

 between the taking of Carthage and the reign of Vespasian, this taste 

 became a perfect passion, and for its gratiiicatiou the senators and 

 patricians, enriched by the spoils of Asia and Africa, incurred the most 

 foolish expense. Thus Licinius Murena, Quintus Hortensius, Lucius 

 Philippus, constructed immense basins, which they filled with the most 

 rare species, and LucuUus, like a new Xerxes, caused a mountain to be 

 pierced to introduce sea-water into his fish-ponds. Varro* relates that 

 Hirrius received twelve millions of sesterces ($075,000) from the numer- 

 ous buildings which he possessed, and that he employed the entire sum 

 in the care of his fishes. The rich patricians, says the same author, 

 were not satisfied with a single pond ; their fish-preserves were divided 

 into compartments, where they kept shut up, apart from each other, 

 fishes of dift'erent kinds; they retained a great number of fishermen 

 solely to take care of these animals. They tended their fish as carefully 

 as their own slaves during sickness. It is even added that a naval 

 expedition, commanded by an admiral, had for its object to introduce 

 upon the coast of Tuscany a sort of scar peculiar to the water of Greece.! 



This extravagant fashion, which spread through the various classes 

 of society, and brought on the ruin of entire families, had also the effect 

 of impoverishing the coasts of the Mediterranean. Ismeral complained 

 that time was no longer given to the fish of the Tyrrhenian Sea to come 

 to maturity. The scandalous luxury displayed in fish-])reserves, and 

 the unwearied attention then directed to marine animals, have furnished 

 no other result useful to pisciculture. The only fact worthy of remark 

 at this epoch of sterile extravagance is the introduction of gold-fish 

 into artificial ponds, where i^hell-fish were also placed for their nourish- 

 ment. 



We may pass rapidly' over the immense interval which separates the 

 Koman Empire from the eighteenth century, without remarking any 

 im[)ortant progress in the husbandry of the waters. The fisherman's 

 art was, however, extended and perfected during the middle ages, 

 and fish-preserves became extremely numerous in France and Italy. 

 Kings and princes all had artificial ponds in their domains, and we be- 

 hold Charlemagne himself taking great pains to keep his own in repair, 

 causing new ones to be dug, and giving orders that the fish produced 

 should be sold. The religious communities exacted enormous duties 

 upon almost all fisheries, and had considerable preserv^es in which mul- 

 titudes of fish grew fat. The maintenance of these preserves requ red 

 many precautions, and the restorer of agriculture in the thirteenth century 

 (Peter of Crescenza) pointed out the manner of getting the greatest 

 result from the lakes of fresh as well as salt water. There appears in 

 his work, however, no method worthy of being noticed here, and the 



*De Re Rustica, book viii, section 17. 



+ For further details, see Noel de la Morimiere, History of Fisbes, vol. i, 1815; Ciiviev 

 and Valenciennes, Natnral History of Fisbes, vol. 1, 1828; and Bureau de la Malle, 

 Political Economy of the Romans, vol. ii, 1840. 



