446 THE DESCENT OF MAN 



selection of any kind. The gold-fish {Cyprinus auratus), 

 judging from the analogy of the golden variety of the com- 

 mon carp, is perhaps a case in point, as it may owe its splen- 

 did colors to a single abrupt variation, due to the conditions 

 to which this fish has been subjected under confinement. It 

 is, however, more probable that these colors have been in- 

 tensified through artificial selection, as this species has been 

 carefully bred in China from a remote period. °'' Under natu- 

 ral conditions it does not seem probable that beings so highly 

 organized as fishes, and which live under such complex re- 

 lations, should become brilliantly colored without sufter- 

 ing some evil or receiving some benefit from so great a 

 change, and consequently without the intervention of nat- 

 ural selection. 



What, then, are we to conclude in regard to the many 

 fishes both sexes of which -are splendidly colored ? Mr. 

 Wallace'" believes that the species which frequent reefs, 

 where corals and other brightly colored organisms abound, 

 are brightly colored in order to escape detection by their 

 enemies; but according to my recollection they were thus 

 rendered highly conspicuous. In the fresh waters of the 

 tropics there are no brilliantly colored corals or other 

 organisms for the fishes to resemble; yet many species in 

 the Amazons are beautifully colored, and many of the 

 carnivorous Cyprinidae in India are ornamented with "bright 

 longitudinal lines of various tints." " Mr. McClelland, in 

 describing these fishes, goes so far as to suppose that "the 

 peculiar brilliancy of their colors" serves as "a better mark 



^^ Owing to some remarks on this subject, made in my work "On the 

 Variation of Animals under Domeatication, " Mr. W. F. Mayers ("Chinese 

 Notes and Queries," Aug. 1868, p. 123) has searched the ancient Chinese 

 encyclopEedias. He finds that gold-fish were first reared in confinement during 

 the Sung Dynasty, which commenced A.D. 960. In the year 1129 these fishes 

 abounded. In another place it is said that since the year 1648 there has been 

 "produced at Hangchow a variety called the fire-fish, from Its intensely rod 

 color. It is universally admired, and there is not a household where it is not 

 cultivated, in rivalry as to its color and as a source of profit." 



™ "Westminster Review," July, ISBT, p. 1. 



" "Indian Cyprinidae," by Mr. J. McOleUand, "Asiatic Researches," voL 

 xii. part ii., 1839, p. 230. 



