THE CARP FAMILY. 97 



Mr. Jesse says of some Carp and Tench which were kept 

 by him, that " they were soon reconciled to their situation, 

 and ate boiled potatoes in considerable quantities ; and the 

 former seemed to have lost their original shyness, eating 

 in his presence without any scruple." My experience 

 agrees with Mr. Jesse's. I have now three sturdy little 

 fellows, in a vivarium within a few yards of me, that will 

 readily take anything I throw them, and almost out of 

 my fingers. These fish have been in the house for nearly 

 a year, and are apparently doing well and growing. One 

 of them affords a good instance of the ' hard-dying ' quali- 

 ties of the species. He was ( killed ' in the usual manner, 

 and consigned, with others, to the cook, in whose care, 

 however, after some hours, he began to show signs of 

 revival. A kind-hearted damsel compassionately trans- 

 ferred him to the vivarium, where he has since thriven, 

 showing no effects of his narrow escape, save a scar on the 

 back of the head, which he will probably never lose. 



There is a pretty instance on record of the taming of 

 the Carp by a little American girl. The child, who was not 

 six years old, lived close to the bank of a pond in the vil- 

 lage of Rockynook, near Kingham, Massachusetts. She 

 began by throwing crumbs into the water. " Gradually the 

 fish learned to distinguish her footsteps, and darted to the 

 edge whenever she approached ; and at last they would even 

 feed out of her hand, arid allow her to stroke their scaly 

 sides. The control of Van Amburgh over his wild beasts 

 was not more complete than that which this child attained 



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