292 HOUSE-MARTINS. 



tions of the glass and water represent them, when , 

 moving, in a shifting and changeable variety of 

 dimensions, shades, and colours ; while the two 

 mediums, assisted by the concavo-convex shape 

 of the vessel, magnify and distort them vastly ; 

 not to mention that the introduction of another 

 element and its inhabitants into our parlours 

 engages the fancy in a very agreeable manner. 



Gold and silver fishes, though originally natives 

 of China and Japan, yet are become so well recon- 

 ciled to our climate as to thrive and multiply very 

 fast in our ponds and stews. Linnseus ranks this 

 species of fish under the genus of cyprinus, or 

 carp, and calls it cyprinus auratus. 



Some people exhibit this sort of fish in a very 

 fanciful way ; for they cause a glass bowl to be 

 blown with a large hollow space within, that does 

 not communicate with it. In this cavity they put 

 a bird occasionally, so that you may see a gold- 

 finch or a linnet hopping, as it were, in the midst 

 of the water, and the fishes swimming in a circle 

 round it. The simple exhibition of the fishes is 

 agreeable and pleasant ; but in so complicated a 

 way becomes whimsical and unnatural, and liable 

 to the objection due to him, 



" Qui variare cupit rem prodigialiter unam." 



LV. 



I THINK I have observed before, that much the 

 most considerable part of the house-martins with- 

 draw from hence about the first week in October ; 

 but that some, the latter broods, I am now con- 

 vinced, linger on till towards the middle of that 

 month ; and that at times, once perhaps in two or 



