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drop from them. That they are best pleased with such 

 jejune diet may easily be confuted, since, if you toss them 

 crumbs they will seize them with great readiness, not to say 

 greediness: however, bread should be given sparingly, lest, 

 turning sour, it corrupt the water. They will also feed on 

 the water-plant called Lemna (duck's meat), and also on 

 small fry. 



When they want to move a little, they gently protrude 

 themselves with their pinnae pectorales ; but it is with their 

 strong muscular tails only that they and all fishes shoot 

 along with such inconceivable rapidity. It has been said 

 that the eyes of fishes are immoveable ; but these appa- 

 rently turn them forward or backward in their sockets as 

 their occasions require. They take little notice of a lighted 

 candle, though applied close to their heads, but flounce and 

 seem much frightened by a sudden stroke of the hand 

 against the support whereon the bowl is hung, especially 

 when they have been motionless, and are perhaps asleep. 

 As fishes have no eyelids, it is not easy to discern when 

 they are sleeping or not, because their eyes are always 

 open. 



Nothing can be more amusing than a glass bowl contain- 

 ing such fishes : the double refractions 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 reconciled 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 



