THE GOLDEN CARP. 185 



The Golden Carp. 



This species is perhaps more familiarly known than any one of 

 the carp tribe, though it has not been long naturalized in this 

 country. It was formerly an inhabitant of China, from whence it 

 was introduced into Europe, first it seems into Portugal, and from 

 thence into other countries. With us, however, it is as yet treat- 

 ed rather as an exotic than a naturalized inhabitant of our waters, 

 being commonly kept pent up in small vivaries, or in glass globes, 

 and is rarely to be found in large open waters ; though without 

 doubt they would increase and prosper in the greater part of them 

 if unexposed to the ravages of the pike or other predaceous animals ; 

 nor are instances wanting to shew that they have increased prodi- 

 giously both in bulk and numbers, when left entirely to themselves 

 in protected situations. The danger to be apprehended would be 

 the severity of our winters, which by freezing over the surface has 

 in some instances, as already noticed,* proved fatal to the common 

 carp. The waters best adapted to them would be those that are 

 rarely if ever frozen entirely over, and it certainly seems that the 

 warmer the waters are the better they are suited to this fish, and 

 that this is equally the case even when the waters are artificially 

 heated, unless the temperature be carried to too high a degree. Mr. 

 Jesse informs us that it is a common practice to keep fishes of this 

 kind in the engine dams belonging to factories, where the water 

 is always at a high temperature generally eighty degrees in 

 consequence of the water from the steam engines being thrown in 

 there from time to time for the purpose of being cooled ; and he 

 then proceeds to state, that three of these fish being put into one 

 of these dams multiplied so exceedingly, that in the course of 

 three years, the whole tribe, (being at the expiration of that period 

 accidentally poisoned by the verdigris mixed from the refuse tallow 

 from the engine), were actually taken out by wheelbarrowsfull. 



See sup. p. 179. 



