EIVER GARDENS ; 



to the one I expected, ending in nothing less than, 

 a determination to leave its native element. Had I 

 seen a Carp or a Tench quietly walk out of the fish- 

 pond and climh a tree, I could not have been more 

 astonished than when I saw this creature of the 

 water which, with its fin-like tail and other ap- 

 pendages, was evidently intended for a denizen of 

 that element, quietly crawl up a stick which was 

 standing in the vessel, and emerging from the 

 water, remain quietly attached to the support it 

 had selected, at some inches above the surface of the 

 element it thus so strangely and suddenly quitted. 

 Its determination appeared the more astonishing, as 

 I soon perceived that its finny tail, its legs, and at 

 last the whole of its skin gradually hardened and 

 blackened, and it appeared to have shared the natu- 

 ral fate of "a fish out of water." After watching 

 it for some days, without perceiving any further 

 change, other matters occupied my attention and 

 I entirely forgot the fate of my voracious pet, which 

 had met such an untimely end in consequence of 

 rashly leaving the proper sphere of its existence. 



Some little time afterwards, I was about to 

 empty the jar, and throw away the stick to which 

 the dried and hardened form of the victim to getting 

 out of bounds was still attached, when I thought I 



