Nothing can be more amusing than a glass bowl containing 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. Linnaeus 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 see a goldfinch or a linnet
hopping as it were in the midst of the water, and the fishes
swimming in a circle round it.
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