S 
Growrs of Hersrvorous Fisues. 349 
ous fishes require some kind of meat, or a mixture in which 
meat or offal forms a part. 
The fishes are fed in the morning and evening of each day, 
and, as they grow very fast, it becomes quite “a chore” for 
the boys and girls to gather them enough herbage, for they 
are so ravenous as to be appropriately compared to the silk- 
worms when forming cocoons. With generous feeding they 
attain to the weight of two or three pounds in fifteen days, 
when they cease growing, and are sold alive throughout the 
great centres of population. 
The fish-culturists of Kiang-si raise uniquely fishes of a 
gout most exquisite. The sea-rabbit is the name given by 
them to a species at once the most delicate and prolific. 
Fish-culture, or pisciculture, seems natural to the Chinese, 
who conduct the industry skillfully and successfully, eulti- 
vating numerous species of herbivorous fishes, which they 
raise with great facility. Herbivorous fishes acclimatize 
much easier than the carnivorous. The French and other 
Europeans have commenced to import herbivorous tishes from 
Itiang-si; the red and gold fishes, originally imported from 
China, may be considered a luxury to the eye, and their sur- 
prisingly rapid increase in numbers without expense has in- 
duced the French to import such food-fishes as are prolitic 
and of excellent flavor. The fresh-water fishes of commerce 
in China form much lighter and more digestible food than 
any fresh-water fishes of either Europe or America. They 
have cultivated their waters, and raised fishes for so many 
hundred years, and perhaps thousands, that their system is 
said to be much more perfect than any now practiced in Eu- 
rope or America; and as France has sent an agent to China 
to study up the subject from an Oriental point of view, it 
might be advisable for our government to instruct its embas- 
sadors to make all the discoveries possible, and report them 
for the benefit of fish-culture in the United States. 
