OBSERVATIONS OF THE CARP 



the Summer season ; and it is observed, that they breed more 

 naturally in ponds than in running waters, if they breed there at 

 all ; and that those that live in rivers, are taken by men of the 

 best palates to be much the better meat. 



And it is observed, that in some ponds Carps will not breed, 

 especially in cold ponds ; but where they will breed, they breed 

 innumerably : Aristotle and Pliny say, six times in a year, if there 

 be no Pikes nor Pearch to devour their spawn, when it is cast 

 upon grass, or flags, or weeds, where it lies ten or twelve days 

 before it be enlivened. 



The Carp, if he have water-room and good feed, will grow to 

 a very great bigness and length : I have heard, to be much above 

 a yard long. 'Tis said, by Jovius, who hath writ of fishes, that in 

 the lake Lurian in Italy, Carps have thriven to be more than fifty 

 pound weight; which is the more probable, for as the Bear is 

 conceived and born suddenly, and being born is but short-lived, 

 so, on the contrary, the Elephant is said to be two years in his 

 dam's belly, some think he is ten years in it, and being born, 

 grows in bigness twenty years ; and 'tis observed too that he 

 lives to the age of a hundred years. And 'tis also observed, that 

 the Crocodile is very long-lived, and more than that, that all that 

 long life he thrives in bigness ; and so I think some Carps do, 

 especially in some places ; though I never saw one above twenty- 

 three inches, which was a great and goodly fish ; but have been 

 assured there are of a far greater size, and in England too. 



Now, as the increase of Carps is wonderful for their number ; 

 so there is not a reason found out, I think by any, why they 

 should breed in some ponds, and not in others of the same 

 nature for soil and all other circumstances : and as their breed- 

 ing, so are their decays also very mysterious : I have both read 

 it, and been told by a gentleman of tried honesty, that he has 

 known sixty or more large Carps put into several ponds near 

 to a house, where by reason of the stakes in the ponds, and the 

 owner's constant being near to them, it was impossible they 

 should be stolen away from him: and that when he has after 

 three or four years, emptied the pond, and expected an increase 

 from them by breeding young ones, for that they might do so, 

 he had, as the rule is, put in three melters for one spawner ; he 

 has, I say, after three or four years, found neither a young nor 



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