Vol. IV. 



JANUARY, 1897. 



Copyright 1897. All Rights Reserved. 



Xo. 43. 



THE NEW YORK AQUARIUM 

 OPENED. 



On December 10, 1896, the doors of 

 the New York Aquarium were opened 

 and tlie public admitted to the lower 

 or main floor of the building. The 

 upper section, being not quite finished, 

 remains closed for awhile yet. The 

 opened section contains eighteen glass- 

 front tanks for marine and as many 

 for fresh-water specimens. The glass of 

 these measures 4x5 feet in some and 4x7 

 feet in others. In some cases the parti- 

 tion wall of two adjoining tanks has 

 been removed and thus the tanks have 

 been made more spacious. Their depth 

 from the glass to the rear wall is about 

 four feet. The glass, imported plate, 

 one inch thick, is set against elastic 

 rubber with waterproof cement. The 

 three inside walls are faced with white 

 glazed tiles. The tanks proper are 

 constructed of brick laid in Portland 

 cement. A more detailed description, 

 also of the working apparatus behind 

 the scenery, we must postpone to some 

 future day. 



The tanks above mentioned are ar- 

 ranged in a circle around the main hall, 

 the so-called Rotunda. In this spacious 



portion of the building are seven ba- 

 sins. One larger, round one and six 

 others of kidney shape. These basins 

 are built in cistern fashion, partly 

 below the floor level, of brick ; they 

 receive a constant supply of fresh sea- 

 water from the bay and are intended 

 for such animals that are best seen 

 from above or the size of which making 

 it imjoracticable of being displayed in 

 plate-glass tanks. The accompanying 

 illustration, which we reproduce with 

 permission of the New York Morgeu 

 Journal, is a very good representation 

 of the interior. 



The round basin, located in the cen- 

 tre of the main floor, has a capacity of 

 50,000 gallons of water. This is a 

 larger body of water than was used in 

 the entire aquarium display at the Co- 

 lumbian Exposition at Chicago. 



On the opening day the management 

 of the Aquarium was able to display 

 one hundred and twenty- five different 

 forms of animal life, of which seventy- 

 eight were fish. This is a remarkably 

 good showing, for it has to be consid- 

 ered that the winter is the worst possi- 

 ble season for the opening of such an 

 institution. 



In the fresh-water section nearly 



