The Formation and Management of a Marine Aquarium. 247 
scene, however beautiful at first, will soon change, unless every needful pre¬ 
caution is observed from first to last, and so if we turn from the scientific 
aspect of the subject, we must not cease to comply with those requirements 
in matters of management, which the scientific aquarian finds essential to 
success. Many of these requirements have been explained already; and 
indeed for a first fair launch in practice the reader has sufficient information 
in the preceding chapters; yet it seems that we may make a few more 
observations with advantage, in order to gather up a few generalities 
connected with the actual work of forming and keeping a marine col¬ 
lection. 
The pleasant way to form a collection is to turn collector; to haunt 
the shore and skim the surface, and drag the bottom of the sea—with 
such nets, dredges, jars, and baskets as suit the scene, the seasons, 
and the collector’s turn of mind. This is a pastime for all seasons, 
but of course is most practised in autumn, for then the seaside becomes 
the home of thousands who at other times are far removed, and it 
may be, in their town residences, as much estranged from ruralities as from 
the less familiar scenery of wave-washed cliffs and sandy beach. The best 
seasons for collecting are summer and autumn, so our social customs do not 
jar with this pursuit. 
It will be a very poor coast indeed that will give nothing suitable for 
the aquarium. Amongst unfrequented rocky inlets where many tide-pools 
are formed will be found the richest harvest. The bleak and bare reaches 
of sand and mud that connect low-lying coasts with the sea are usually 
comparatively barren, but rocks are fruitful, and even sand and mud are 
never utterly barren. It is well to know what to collect, or at all events 
what to keep. We may pick up all sorts of things for amusement, and 
be instructed by our observations of their character, but it is not every 
product of the sea that may be obtained in this way that is adapted for 
the aquarium. For example—the example being an unwelcome one— 
scarcely any sea-weeds, of whatever kind of colour, will live for any length 
of time in a tank. My own rule of action is to exclude from the tank 
every scrap of vegetation except such as is actually produced in the vessel 
itself—its own spontaneous growth. But at first start, and in forming 
temporary collections, whether to be abandoned when the season is over, 
or to form the nuclei of permanent collections, a few of the small-growing 
green weeds will be useful. Two at least may be specified as the 
