book of vermilion fish

8/13/2019 Book of Vermilion Fish

1/94

A Version of the Book of Vermilion FishAuthor(s): A. C. MouleSource: T'oung Pao, Second Series, Vol. 39, Livr. 1/3 (1950), pp. 1-82Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4527273Accessed: 24/07/2010 08:15

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available athttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unlessyou have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and youmay use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained athttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=bap .

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printedpage of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

BRILL is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to T'oung Pao.

http://www.jstor.org
http://www.jstor.org/stable/4527273?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=baphttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=baphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/4527273?origin=JSTOR-pdf


2/94

A VERSION OFTHE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH1)

BY

A. C. MOULE

The gi* g 9 9 Chu sha yu p'qx s a little monograph onred-and-white gold fish, written apparently at Su-chou at theend of the sixteenth century, but not printed until I9I4 when itwas included n the supplement o the Mei shg ts'ung shg 2). Amanuscript opy of the Ming dynasty, formerly n the library ofT X Ting Ping in the g Z 4 T'ou-fa Hsiang at Hang-*chou, s now in the National Central Library at Nanking ). The

I) The plan of this article is to begin with a preface about The Book of Fermilion Fishand its author, to be followed by a long introduction which gives, first, versions of what

-some Chinese authors have written about gold fish from the eleventh century to the seven-

teenth; secondly, translations an.d extracts from a few European authors of the seven-

teenth and eighteenth centuries; and thirdly, some personal reminiscences of gold fish

in China sixty years ago. Finally comes the attempted version of the book itself. I am

-immensely indebted to Professor Gustav Haloun for the kindest possible help throughout.

He actually copied out the whole text of two of the longest passages for me when I was

far from books in the war, and any bibliographical or biographical notes which may be

found are almost entirely his.

2) It is the third item in the third volume of the tenth Collection, t * *

kuang she of Shanghai, I9I4 (2nd edition I928).

3) This is described in the Ting Catalogue * * @ g g @ i Shan pen

shu shih tsang shu chih c. I8 fol. I3r, where it is noted that it is not included in ffi 0;

g @ + ; Chang shWh sang shu shih chxng (cf. ibid. c. I9 fol. 20r, and

X @ @ u g g Ts'u.ng shu shu mu hvi pien p. 379), and that it had been

in the library of @ . R Pao Shih-feng of 2 'J&yU ang-hu, or e 'jU P'ing-

hu. The Pao of P'ing-hu seem to ha^Je been connected with the Chang of K'un-shan bymarriage. In the Nanking Library, to which the Ting Lit?rary was transferred, the MS.

mrill be found in c. 26 fol. g8v of the Catalogue, where it is marked r X W

Fp i ,+ . Dr Yuan T'ung-li has kindly given me a copy of the manuscript.

T'oung Pao, XXXIX I


3/94

A. C. MOULE

author dates the book simply jN E|3 ping-shen without otherindication, and signs himself 88 Ch'ien-te, descended romi@ R 0 * Yen po kou t'u. This was the pen-name of ffi;t 9 Chang Chih-ho of * * Chin-hua c. A.D. 780. For-tunately the next item in the Mei shqs s'ung shu is a little bookabout Tea ($ i3z h'a ching) by the same author, and here hegives the full date Wan-li ptng-shen, or I596, and signs himself

ffi Chang Ch'ien-te, with the pen-name >i * & Ch'u chuehsheng. In yet another ittle tract ( ^ t t P'ing hua p'u) hegives a second hao or pen-name, ffi X ;t M#ng tieh chait'u, which betrays again the same affection or Chuang Tzu asappears at least twice in the text of the Chu sha yu p'u itself. Fromthe text we learn too that he lived in Su-chou rom I588, wherehe seems to have made a great name as an amateur breeder ofvermilion ish, and was evidently still there in I596. Later in lifehe changed his names, making his ming @ Ch'ou, tzu *: t(*) Ch'ing-fu, nd hao s fi Mi-an. He was greatly delightedat obtaining n I6I5 an important autograph by s X Mi Fei(I05I-II07) and named his library w s " Pao Mi hsuan,using the words as yet another pen-name or hao for himself. Hewas born, it is said, in I577 and died in I643, the son of ChangS t Ying-wEn tzg 0 t Mao-shih), collector of calligraphyand paintings, of , I]J K'un-shan, who moved (perhaps nI588) to Su-chou 1).

..

I) The date of his birth, which is surprising in view of the dates which he mentions

in this book-I588, I590, I596, and of his death is taken from ffi " $ ChangWei-hsiang ffi t$ t g S I nien lu hui psen, I925, C. 8 fol. 3r, where the

dates are taken from ^ * Wu Hsiu g ffi + + Hsx i nien lu, I878,

c. 3, where no authority is given. Short notices of Ch'ou will be found in Chung kgo jetc

ming ta tz'S tien, I925, p. 923, and of his father Ying-wen, ibid. p. 972 (repeated in [p

g ^ @ t jW W Chung kuo tsang shu chia *'ao lush, I929, fol. 87r).See aSso Ssu k'u ch'uan shu t3xng mu, CC. II3, I3V; I23, 7r-8v; I34, I3V. The father


4/94

THE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH 3

For my knowledge of the book I am indebted to ProfessorGustav Haloun of Cambridge, ho very kindly drew my attentionto it as soon as a- copy of the Mei shu ts'gng shu was obtained bythe University Library here. The special interest of the book isthat the author does not copy out what had been written by hispredecessors r quote the poems of Su Tung-p'o, but just tells uswhat his own beautiful ish were like and how he spent his quiet

days watching them, at early dawn, in gentle wind, in drizzlingrain, on moonlight nights; how he fed them, and sheltered hemfrom winter's frost, or summer's scorching sun. And he is theonly author known to me who deals with the fish of Su-chourather than with those of Che-chiang r Peking. He writes, as Ihave said, only about red-and-white ish1), mentioning ure whitefish only to condemn hem, and not so much as mentioning pure

red, pure black, red-and-black, ed-white-and-black, lack-and-white, or olive green. That he does not speak of protruding eles-cope eyes, or of "egg fish" with shiny finlessbacks, may be becausethose strange forms were not yet known; or there s no clear men-tion of them in the seventeenth entury writers who will be quotedbelow; while of the upturned ky-gazing yes there seems to be nosure evidence earlier than my own knowledge hat my brother

and I knew them at Hang-chou ixty-six years ago. On the otherhand there has been a sad falling off in tails since the sixteenthcentury. No modern writer, Chinese or Western, seems to know

-

* ffi Z Chin yx fu (an elaborate and difficult composition which does not throw

light on the history or forms of the fish) will be found in M * R g Li tai fu

hui c. I37.

I) He does not use the familiar + ffi chin yu, 'gold fish', once. It is interesting-

also to notice that in the " ^ 2} i Su chog fu chih, ed. I69I, I692, C. 22

( * g ) fol. I3V, there is no chin yu, but only s 9 chu yu, 'vermilion fish'

with the note: >*> t t - t * t @ Q ; g " There are

three kinds, red, white, and mottled. They are kept in bowls or jars as pets".


5/94

4 A.. C. MOULE.

of a tail with more than four lobes, but Chang s not alone at hisdate in speaking of five, seven, or even nine tails; the odd numbersperhaps btained by reckoning he two middle, and often conjoined,lobes as one.

My interest in what the Chinese have had to say about thesrgold fish was roused by a correspondence ith Mr George F.Hervey, very well known o gold-fish anciers n England, o whom

I owe not only my general nterest n the subject, but directly orindirectly all that I know of the introduction of gold fish intoEurope and of the European iterature about them.

Chinese gold fish, as we know them today with their quaintlypathetic forms and beautiful colours, are a comparatively modernproduct of Chinese kill. It is likely enough that, under the in-

fluence of the Buddhist exhortations o set life free (t M fangsheng), people had found naturally red or yellow varieties of thecommon or other carp (,,X,, i or sp cht) to set free or, as onesceptic has said> o imprison n the stone-walled ools of monaste-ries ever since such pools were made 1) And indeed g * Tu Fu

I) According to the Tz u hai s.v. t M the earliest reference to the custom

is in Lteh tzx c- 8 ( , t) fol I2r i E{. t t 6 t JU @;

"To release living creatures on New Year's Day is a proof of goodness". The date of the

true text of Lieh tzV may be late in the third century B.C., but this passage is perhaps

an interpolation. See also A. Waley Three Ways of Thoxght, I939, p. 258. J. J. M. de Groot,

Le Code d?s Mahaydna pp. IIO-I26, says that the custom is not heard of before the fifth

subject - Liang shu c. 50 fol. 8v; Nan shih c. I9 fol. 4v. The first official reference to

pools for fish is said to be about A.D. 759 when the Emperor decreed the pronsion of

such pools in eighty-one p]aces, - cf. f 9 /^ t t Ye lu kung wen chi

(ed. Ss pu ts'ung k'an) c. 3 fol. , 3; C. 4 fol. I-3. The decree seems to have specified among

other places Sj ffi g Che hsi tao, which included Hang chou, Hu chou, andSu chou. Yen's inscription ( X T t t 'jlg g B ) is dated 22 March 760.

But a similar anonymous inscription had been engraved in the autumn of 75I,-cf. *

4 4 Chin shWh 1v c. 7 fol. 7v, l 4> E + t t '2ikg ; and thepool of the Yu ch'uan (p. I3 n. I below) is attributed to the fifth century.


6/94

5HE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH

(7I2-770), in an allegorical poem where he writes of "a great ishcomparable o a man in length, with vermilion ail and scales ofyellow gold", may seem to have seen such giant golden carp asnow adorn the temple pools 1).

In the ninth century there are several mentions of red or, onceat least, gold-coloured arp. Thus G , go Po Chu-i (28 Feb.77Z-Sept. 46) has these lines about the pond which he had lately

made in front of his holiday cottage on the borders of the modernChiang-hsi province:

The sound of many waters in the Three Ravines,Or boundless breadth of the Myriad Acres Pool;These may not be compared o the embroidery f ripplesMoved by the breeze on my new pond.Small duckweed preads floating over the surface,

The new rushes stand up in ordered ranks,With red carp of two or three inches,And eight or nine white lotus flowers.By the waterside I mean to make a path;I have just set some wattle-work o prop the bank.Already by the visitors among the hillsIt has been named the White Family's Pool.

Dr Arthur Waley very kindly tells me that Po had only one suchcottage, and that it was built in the winter of 8I6-I7 on the slopesof the g; ,l g Hsiang-lu eng in the ,@ Lu mountains, aboutten miles south-west of ^g g Hsun-yang (modern Kiukiang)-As Po left the district n the winter of 8I8 and visited his cottageonly once again, in 822, we may be fairly sure of the place and

I ) ti I g g X Tu Axng px shih chi c. 2 fol. 2gv or ti /+> R +t Tu shao ling ch'xan chi c- 3 fol- 4Iros 'iRw X 4 2>; p] p fljt k ,t

)< he4 ,wfiE".


7/94

6 A. C. MOUIJE

date (8I7 or 8I8) of this early mention of golden carp kept in aprivate garden pond for ornament) s we can hardly doubt, eventhough some of them may have been destined ater to be fried 1).For Po Chu-i s quoted as writing n another poem which I havenot traced, "On a portable stove in the prow of the boat I cookmy rice and fry red carp." ) And Wen T^ing-yun c. 860) writes,{'The sun's reflection by its brightness extinguishes the golden

coloured carp." )But the first mention of gold fish ( + 2 chin yu) which really

suggests that they were kept and cared for seems to date from thetenth century when we read: "If gold fish eat the refuse of olivesor soapy water, then they die; if they have poplar bark they donot breed lice." )

I g g * * * ^ ^ 9 9 9 H * Z S%Su*btbtatgt**W*t1vFX

i S8J' *t zEdt gAZZt . , - - t b X

/@Aw*tS#X4StZEEE@$

+ffAt'.k , k Ch'ang ch'ing chs, ed. I606, C. 7 fol. 8; Chiu t'ang shu c. I66 fol. 8v.

From the poem ,J 'g (ibid. fol. Ior) we gather that the pond was little more thanten feet square.

2) P'es wen yun /4 s- v xb i-3) ffi g * A A WeAn 'tng yun shWh hi (ed. SsW pu ts'ung k'an) c. 3 fol.

4) * , t X i Wu Zei hsiang kan chih in * $ ^ n Pen {s'aohang mtf c. 44 fol. 24v. This anonymous work, formerly attributed to Su Tung-p'o, is

now attributed to the monk w W Tsan-ning (9I8-999). The text may be found in

a more or less complete form in the following collections: W X sl t; T'ang

sung ts'ung shu; * * * 8 X Pao yen t'ang pi chi; , /g} Shuo fu; vx

X ffi X Hsieh yu ts'ung t'an; and i Z oJ R Wu ch'ao hsiao shuo.

The only one of these which is at my disposal, the Shuo fu, does not include the

present passage.


8/94


In the eleventh century gold fish, still, as far as we can judge,red or white varieties of the chi with no abnormal hapes, arementioned by three well known poets and by others of less fame.

Su Tung-p'o has a poem entitled "The West Lake revisitedafter an Absence-from Hang-chou of fifteen Years" which begins:


9/94

8 A. C. MOULE

words at first, until I came as Assistant Governor o Ch'ien-tXang,when I knew that in the pool at the back of the Monastery herewere these fish like the colour of gold. Yesterday I strolled abovethe pool again, throwing n cakes and biscuits for a long time.And indeed they came out a little, but went back again withouteating, so that I could not see them again From the time thatTzu-mei wrote the poem until now is more than forty years, and

there was already the phrase 'lingered ate'; so these fish havelong valued themselves, or if they were not slow to come forwardand quick to retire and careless of food, how could they haveattained this age ?" 1) The point of this story is the reluctanceof the fish to show themselves and to take food (a reluctancewhich in the course of nine centuries they seem to have over-come), which was sometimes regarded as an almost miraculous

appearance nd disappearance, s will be seen below.Su Tzu-mei has left us also a line meaning perhaps something

I) A iQ i g Tung p'o chih lin quoted in g X t t Leng chai

yeh hua by E ' Hui-hung (I07I-II28), in flj S ,:b Hsi h chih c. 24 fol.

37r. The same story, without the last sentence, is quoted by g + 4 Lin Tzu-jen

(C. IIOO) from 7i; M M Hsien sheng hth hxa in Chi chu fen lei ... shih c. 8fol. IOV, and in many subsequent works. B w 0; Su Shun-ch'in (I008-I048)e

who seems to have been commonly known by his tzx + t Tzu-mei, is not recorded

to have lived anywhere near Hang-chou before I040 or I04I, when he lived in Su-chou

andbecameGovernorofHu-chouinIo42. Hislinesare: ik vl. g g 4 4>2e11 R E X ff . Tung-p'o, whose words would seem to date this poem about

the year I032, may have mistaken the date, or may have written his own note long afterhe left Hang-chou in I074, perhaps in I089; or perhaps Tzu-mei may have visited Hang-chou several years before he resided in the region. cf. Sung shih c. 442 fol. 2V-5V. I havenot found the poem, * 9 4 (v-l- t or t; 4 ) 4 4 in B B + t

Su hsueh shih chi (ed. SsB pu ts'ung k'an), the only collection of his poems available.4 t % Chiang Chih-ch'i (I03I-II04) has a poem on the same Pagoda pool ( 4*

ffi 'g chin yu ch'ih), in which he refers to the shyness of the fish, seeming toallude to Tung-p'o's story in the words * n X ju tzVchen, "as if they valuedthemselves",-cf. Hsien shun lin an chWh . 77 fol. IIr.


10/94

9HE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH

like "The silver chi is the beauty of fishes at dawn". And the

-reference o the golden chi 1). Tung-p'o oo has a second referencewhich gives us another ocality. He merely says that he waitedin vain for a friend by the "pool of the golden chi" (chin chi ch'ih)which, as we gather from the long title of the poem, was nearthe Feng-shui Cave at Hsin-ch'#ng near Fu-yang, up the riverthirty-three miles south-west of Hang-chou ).

In the twelfth century we read of golden chi in the pool of anancient monastery near Hu-chou in Che-chiang hus: "In the-Ching-she Monastery at Shang-ch'iang n Hu-chou there is a[statue of] Kuan-yin of the Ch' n dynasty (557-589) The titleof the monastery was written by Shang Chung-jung. The threegates are a hundred eet high and are called the Three Excellences.

Moreover n the pool are golden chi, which are seen once in severalyears. Thus a poem of Po Lo-t'ien (Chu-i) ontains the sentence:'There s only the Ching-she Monastery t Shang-ch'iang, placemost worthy of a visit, which I have not visited', referring amelyto this." The author proceeds o quote the lines of Su Tzu-mei,adding he note: "This also has regard o their appearances eingperiodical, and so he says:'To the end of the day I waited forthem'." )

I) SU hsueh shih chi c. 7 fol. Sr, 4 + @ : gz @|1 @ 9 t i

and P'ei wen yun fu s.v. 4> RD2) Su we^z chxng kung shih chi c. g fol. 3v, X g WWW g t

tt e -- H WK*'1MAtW= . . . . bM,ep

ffi-P144RsWt_kth4*|PU9ffi$Rk AtXXtt tZ9X @ttXoXtX"WRil"2*9+t't


11/94

IOA. . MOULE

The references o golden chi already quoted seem all to refer to

the rovinceof Ch#-chiang, ut the earliest mention ofactual breed-

ersof gold fish is at Peking, or 41 g Chung-tu s it was called

in he Chin dynasty. The author of the T'ing shWh rites: "Golden

Chi ish: At the present ime there are fish breeders n Chung-tu

who an change the colour of fish to gold. The chi are the most

prized, nd li are next to them. Many scoop out stone to make a

pool,and place it betweenthe eaves and the lattice (i.e. on the

F AB+t *9++XG ZX W t g t \ t 4 Z R 4 t X i n + *

t QW+g uXx

* tt ffi tkao

9, ffi ffi 8, Yun yg yang ch'xu, c. II64 (ed. M * * * Li tas

shxh xa, I770, XII), by g _IL t Ke Li-fang, c. I6 fol. I4v-I5r.Ke took his chin

shWhegree in II38 and dates his own preface in II64, the yearof his death. The lines

by Po Chu-i are the second couplet of a four-line stanza which doesnot mention the fish

or even the pool, so that, although they are introducedwith "thus" ( jW ) just after

the mention of the fish, they do not show that the fish werethere when they were written.

The stanza is said to be preserved in the ;^ * ;gt* Yu ti chi sheng, 22I, by

I $ t WangHsiang-chih,whenceitwasincorporatedinG g; g S S

Po hsiang shan shih chi,I703, C. 39 j , t fol. IIV, w ; F Z 14

g * 4: . The title has an undated note that the lines arestill to be seen engraved

on stone in Hu-chou; and the verse itself is followed by a noteby the compiler, / s

$ Wang Li-ming: "The Ching-she Monastery on the Shang-ch'ianghill in @ 9 g

Kuei-an hsien in Hu-chou contains poems by T'ang authorsengraved on stone. Po Chu-i,

Li Po-yueh, Kao Chih-chou, Ch'ien Ch'i, and Lang Shih-yuanall harre verses there."-

followed by a shortened extract from the Yg ti chi shEng. he chapteron Hu-chou is missing

in the modern MS. copy of the Yti ti chi shEng n the Peiping NationalLibrary. I owe the

reference to the Po hsiang han shih chi to Dr Waley, who writes:"If it is really by Po,

it probably dates from 825-6 whenhe was at Soochow and his friend i 3t M Ts'ui

Hsuan-liang at Hoochow." Dr Lionel Giles kindly tellsme that according to the ChF

chiang tung chWh. 20, the monastery was changed from a +ssW o a R yxan in

847, and that the pool ( g: ) was half a mu in extent andcontained 9 man ish with

gold streaks on the back, which appeared when prayerswere offered for rain.


12/94

THE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH II

verandah ?) to provide amusement. If you ask the secret they (the

breeders) are silent and refuse to tell. Some say that they feedthem on the little red insects from the foul ditch in the walledmarket; and that for a hundred days all fish are alike, first whitelike silver, next gradually yellow, then after a time gold. I havenot had leisure to prove whether this is true or not. There arealso, besides these, snow-white bodies with black spots, quitelustrous like varnish, and called tortoiseshell fish, whose

markingsare specially beautiful. When I-hsi was returning to Shu (i.e.Ssui-ch'uan) he filled three large boats with water which he haddipped out of the lake that he might stealthily take away morethan two kinds of these beautiful gems. And since only Hang-choumen knew how to feed and breed them, he smuggled some of them

also to go with him. When I examine the poem of Su Tzui-mei

which says: 'At the Pine Bridge I waited for the golden chi; Tothe end of the day I lingered late alone'. and a poem by Tung-p'oalso says: 'I know the golden chi fish of Nan-p'ing'; I concludethat gold fish already existed in chih-p'ing (IO64-IO67); but nodoubt not in their present abundance." 1)

So far we have found gold and silver fish half domesticated inthe pools of Buddhist monasteries n Che-chiang; and kept and bred

(implying that they were kept as ornaments or pets in private hou-ses) in Chung-tu in the north and also, apparently, in Hang-chou.Before we leave the Sung dynasty it remains to notice a famous

I) g a T'ing shih (ed. Ssfi pu ts'ung k'an, facsimile of Yuan print) c. 1200, C. I2

fol. ii. The author J. 3 Yo K'o lived from II73 to I240. I cannot be sure that I

have rightly taken 2 JJ I-hsi to be a man's name, and in any case I have not beenable to identify and date him. The lake is perhaps the West Lake at

Hang-chou.For

thedate Chih-p'ing the text reads 2 Ch'eng-p'ing, certainly a misprint.Even this passage, though it tells first of the famous Gold Fish Pool of Peking, comes

back to Che-chiang with the remark that "only Hang-chou men knew how to feed andbreed them".


13/94

I2 A. C. MOULE

pool where the fish seem perhaps to have been wild; and quite

definite evidence that they were bred and sold in Hang-chou andkept in the palaces and great houses there.

The pool in question, which has found its way into Martini

and so into Du Halde and other European books, is the 1 'Lung t'an in Ch'ang-hua Hsien west or south-west of Hang-chou.In the Hsien sh/un in an chih we read: "Ch'ien-ch'ing Hill: Ts'en-

liao tzui has the phrase: 'This hill with its irregular lofty peakscrowns half the sky'. The top has an expanse of a thousand ch'ing.

There is the Dragon Pool (Lung t'an) surrounded with dense beds

of reeds and rushes. In the pool the fish are gold and silver in colour.If one prays for rain there is immediate response. To the west is

the So-lo cliff, where one tree of the so-to lower (?shorea)

grows luxuriantly . . . The flowers open in the early summer,

and the scent can be smelt for several li. Pyrus, daphne, andhIang-ch'ing grow all over the slopes of the hill. . . . The poem

by jJJ Hu - of Hsin-an 'On being ordered by the TA-shou-kung to catch gold and silver fish' says: 'The Ch'ien-ch'ing Hill

is sixty li high; on it is a cold pool clear and fresh. A divine dragoncame hither long ago to coil itself within. To make sweet rain for

the people it was willing to rise up. All the fish follow it as it floatsor sinks; gasping, shining brilliantly, like sun or moon in the

deep; their natural shapes and substance superior to the common

fins; either like beautiful jade, or like gold, or black, or red, or

mottled; such as drive the painter to despair. For how many

years they lay hid and few men knew; till one morning theirfame has stirred the metropolis'. 1)

Ak m a iht * RI St ril t rP *1. a-aA ,t *afi 2zo -I 00 PR * c+


14/94

THE BOOK OF VERMILION F1SI. I3

Finally the author of the Meng liang lu, who describes Hang-chou as he had known it at the very end of the Sung dynasty,writes: "Gold Ssh nclude those of silver, white, tortoiseshell, ndother colours." Then, after quoting both the Su Tung-p'o verses,he goes on: "So these fish existed in old days also. At the presenttime many of them are bred and kept outside the Ch'ien-t'angGate, and are brought into the city for sale. This is called the

{little fish trade'. The palaces and mansions of the great keepthem in tanks and ponds. In the pool of Yu ch'uan by the Ch'ing-chih mound there is an abundance of large ones, and the clearwater, bubbling pring, and great fishes swimming about are verylovely." 1)

kS'U2MBRXAt Atati$t +S

W A $ X A | E#t9fl* g}#Z$i SR>+'A- -atFRSo

JA W^Xpi : +, Hsien shun lin an chih, c. I274 (ed. I830), C. 27 fol. I5r-I6r. I g ^ Ts'en-liao zu is the monk t; 'iE Tao-ch'ien, . I077. I have notidentified he poet Hu, but the date must be in the latter part of the twelfth century,as Kao Tsung abdicated and retired o the newly built Te shou kung in Hang-chou n23 (24) July II62, and died there in II87. cf. Yg ti chi sheng c.l. fol. 2V, t tEpi a d Chien ao in an chih, c. II70 (ed. Wx lin changku ts'1+ng ien)c. I fol. I-2;

Sung shWh . 32 fol. 6v.s) ffi g g Meng iang lu, c. I280, C. I8 fol. I5V. The author, a f g

Wu Tzu-mu, wrote this interesting book after the fall of the Sung dynasty as a recordof the luxury and splendour which he had known n Hang-chou, r Lin-an, when it wasthe capital. The k k pS Ch'ien-t'ang Gate, probably he oldest of the city gates,led, until it was destroyed under he Republic, o the north-east orner of the West Lake.

# t hsiao chsng hi in the R g * s Wu lin chiu shWh f about the same

date, c. 6 fol. I6r. The great pool of the i ^; Yu ch'uan to the north-west f the

Lake, full of gold and other fishes two or three feet long, was "very lovely" at the be-ginning of this century and, we may hope, remains o still. The pool seems to date fromc. 480, and the presence f gold fish there at the end of the twelfth century s shown bythis line of t jW Tao-chi: F ,^ + p st tt @ I only see the goldenchi rising and sinking here".-cf. Lin an chih c. 38 fol. I.


15/94

I4 A. C. MOULE

As far as I know the fourteenth century adds little and thefifteenth nothing o our knowledge f gold fish in China , thoughit seems, as will be seen, to be likely that the evolution of themodern ancy fish began at the very end of the fifteenth century;and so I give now in chronological rder versions of the moreimportant passages rom books of the sixteenth and seventeenthcenturies, ampered nfortunately y the great obscurity f style and.

difficulty of technical erms in some of the most nteresting arts.I. "The seventh [kind of fishg s called @ ffi p'en yu, 'BowE

Fish', and includes gold (the colour s reddish yellow; hence thename), jade (the colour s white like jade), tortoiseshell, rystal,blue. (The peculiar varieties, ike the 'plum-blossom pots', 'horn-bill red', 'sky-and-land division' classes, are too many in nameand colours o be exhaustively known). Those whospeak of them]

say that the fish came originally rom the river Mei ), and werenaturally of the two colours red and white. Female and male[of these two colours] pair together and produce mottled fish;if one takes a g t ch't-hga ish to pair with a white fish theywill produce bright blue coloured ish; if again one takes a shrimpto pair with a fish then the fishes tails will be exaggerated ike ashrimp's. Coming o those which have three tails or five tails, theyare all the product of fanciers n modern times; before Hung-chih (I488-I505) they did not exist." )

I) This statement refers only to books, and takes no account of representations ofgold fish which may exist in paintings or on pottery for which I have been able to make

no search. 2) i Mei is a river in Ssu-ch'uan.

3) * 9 g zkb Jen ho hsien chih, chou), ed. I687, C. 6 fol. 23r. This passage,

except the first two notes in brackets, seems to be taken from Wan li hang chou fts chWh,

C. I600, C. 32 fol. I2r, and is not in the original Jen ho hsien chih, I549 (ed. Wx lin changku ts'"ng pien pt I7), C. 3 fol. 3IV, where we find simply * tjt chin yu and @

ffi yin yu without note. Chinese . . Porcelain in the David.Collection, P1. I29, shows

a vase of c. I475 with 5 red fish. Of the 3 visible on the Plate, one seems to have-three tails; but as the whole fish is only 3/8 in. long, it is hard to be sure.


16/94

THE BOOK OF VERMIEION FISH IS

2. "Gold Fish: Gold fish are not recorded n the books. TheShx p'u (c. IN240) takes it that they were only in the pool of themonastery of the Liu-ho Pagoda; so the poem on the Liu-hoPagoda by Su Tzu-mei ays: 'Along by the bridge I waited for thegolden cht; to the end of the day I lingered ate alone'. Tung-p'oalso says: 'I know the golden chi fish of Nan-p'ing'. After theMigration o the South (c. II30) they increased and flourished.

According o this they began n the Sung and were bred at Hang-chou. Nowadays among the Palace servants at the two capitals,south and north, there are those who keep them. Moreover heyare different from those of Hang-chou, he red really like thecolour of blood; but the taste, compared with the l0t fu or chi,falls far short of Hang-chou. And there are golden li which arealso beautiful. With regard o the two fishes (i.e. the /" (or chi) andli), though some are produced by breeding, yet there are who saythat [if they are fed on] the little red insects from the foul ditch inthe market-place hen the black ftf will change to golden colour.The T'ing shWh lso says: 'At the present time &c. (Here followsa shortened quotation of part of the passage given on p. I0, IIabove: ('At the . . . . to tell")'. Now at my nephew's home thereis a pond which commonly has none of this breed; but suddenlyone day the whole pond was full of golden cht. Of this also I donot know the reason, and I fear that these last two stories arenot true." 1)

3. 'sGoldFish Class: Oncewhen I was puzzled hat the coloursofgolden fish should be varied, I made a thorough examination of

I)t

1ffi ffi Ch' hsiu lei kao, c. 1568 (ed. I775), by 13 g Lang Ying

(I487-C. I570) C. 43 fol. 8-9. Lang was a native of Jen-ho, but lived near the g gj

Ts'ao-ch'iao Gate in Ch'ien-t'ang or the southern part of Hang-chou city, and was known as

|w W Ts'ao ch'iao tzu. He is said to have been working at this book in Ij66.The 2 ; Shu p'u is by g X Tai Chih (c. I240).


17/94

T6 A. C. MOULE

the passages n books on fish. The Shan has ching and the I wxchWh o not mention them. But when I read the Tzi hsix g therewas the saying: 'Net the tortoiseshell, hook the purple cowry' 1),and 'In the Fish-weed Cave place the five-coloured triped fish'.So I knew that the colours had been from the beginning naturallyvarious, and that 'gold fish' was an intentional general name.Regarding he fact that the classes contain good and bad it is

said that the skill [to produce hese] lies with t-he breeders, ormay this be completely rejected. Now men's preferences hangewith time. First they prized pure red and pure white. Later theyhave prized 'golden heads', 'golden saddles', embroidered over-lets', and 'seal-head ed', 'wrap-head ed', 'joined-gills ed', 'head-and-tail red', 'hornbill red', like the 'eight diagrams', ike the'colour of dice'. They also produced ounterfeits. Afterwards hey

have prized 'ink-black eyes', 'snow-white eyes', 'scarlet eyes','purple yes', 'agate eyes', {amber yes'; 'four red [lines]' o (twelvered [lines]', two sixes of red [lines]', at the extreme what is calledstwelve white [lines]'; and 'piled up gold', 'inlaid jade', 'fallingflowers', flowing water', 'cut-off', red dust', 'lotus errace', eightmelon seeds'; varieties without number. In a word men havedecreed names according o their fancy, following the varyingappearances. With regard o 'flower ish' the common lassilScationis mistaken, men not knowing hat the divine sorts wereall at first

flower fish', and have developed changes n the course of time

till they can scarcely be recorded; and thered-headedvarieties

I) t fl Wen hsuan ed. Ssu pu ts'ung k'an) c. 7 fol. 30v, + ,@ R M

has not been traced. The S Z ogg Shan hai ching s an ancient geography bookdating perhaps from the early Han dynasty, with some parts possibly earlier. The X

* i I wu chWhs probably the book of that title by 'j,4A; 3mj Shen Ju yunof the T'ang dynasty.


18/94

THE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH I7

all belong to the ordinary categories. Classification by eyes, though

it is preferable to [classification by] reds, is as it were exaggerated

and must be imperfect; these do not include the whole fish. And

also indeed that red avoids yellow, white avoids wax-colour,

cannot fail to be observed. As for the blue fish and crystal fish,

they are naturally creatures of pools and ponds which connois-

seurs of fish do not deign to notice. As for the three-tailed, four-

tailed, and many-tailed fish, they are all originally of one kind;

their bodies are compact and stunted and their colours fresh and

brilliant; they may be found in all classes. The gold bands (that

is, tails) and silver bands, Kuang-ling, Hsin-tu, and Ku-su vie

one with another in prizing them. Now fish are merely one kind

of moving creatures, but they provide many proofs of how men

prize the glitter of every passing fashion." 1)

9T U X- Ao* 9J- MA Xt Hi m pon

AX*t44Xt#*gttZb44 *

;XWAt/Ett I5,1 -f d #xt]

A[]":sR *": :C%"*X "

:i_z#@#B%=GA

1i 44* 44X X{t//1

T'oung Pao, XXXIX 2


19/94

I8 A. C. MOULE

4. "Collected Explanations: Shih-chAn says, Of gold fish thereare several kinds, namely AT li,

`- chi, jJ ch'iu, and ts'an.The ch'iu and ts'an are specially difficult to obtain. Only thegolden chi has long persisted. Formerly in ancient times they werelittle known. But the Po wu chih says, '[Gold fish] come from the

P'o-sai river in Kung; in the head there is gold'; but this must

be a mistaken report. The Shu i chi records that $ HuanCh'ung (328-384) of the Chin, visiting Mount Lu, saw that in the

dwh~ L T~3ixP i F;4} }X9[omit ] I

Sfpq eifiS W- [*]i a %

[F]4~~~~fi [X][omit" gR * g X B Q e [omitme est] l-

ZHh bE g a t w#ordsand remarks in square brackets give the variants found in the text as printed in Ku

chin t'u shu chi ch'eng s.v. l>-l .MS ffi ffi K'ao p'an yii shih, c. i590 (ed. X j; g Lung wei pi

shtu), c. 3 fol. 27r'-28r'. The author ,a fk T'u Lung was a native of Ning-po, andtook his chin shih degree in I577. Professor Haloun tells me that the edition of K'ao p'an

yii shih included in the Lung wei pi shu (c. I795) has a postscript by M a * T'uChi-hsu and a preface by k * "e Ch'ien Ta-hsin, both dated I785; and that theundated K'ao p'an yii shih was included in the first collection (IE jFj) ofJfl X Pao yen t'ang Pi chi, printed in i6o6. It seems to be probable, but not certain,that the k 'fip Chin yui p'in, separately included in the

,LA- .X

ffi RAi Pa hung yu hsi ts'ung t'an of uncertain date, was originally an independentwork and only later included in the K'ao p'an yii shith.

The use of the word * kuan by goldfish fanciers in the sense of a "band of colour"

has escaped the notice of lexicographers; and the original gloss ,4 .j, "tails", does.

not agree with the detailed and more convincing explanation given on p. 23 below. Thewhole passage is obscure, and in spite of the very kind help of Professor Haloun in some

places much of the translation remains uncertain.

Kuang-ling, AJj g Hsin-tu, and " I Ku-su represent Yang-chou,Yen-chou in Che-chiang or Hsin-tu in Ssu-ch'uan (?), and Su-chou respectively.


20/94

THE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH I9

lake there were fish with red scales, which were namely these 1)..

No one kept them domesticated before the Sung (960-I280), but

now in every place people keep them in their houses for amusement..

They spawn on water-weed at the end of Spring; and they are

fond of devouring their own young. They also change and are

transformed. When first hatched they are dark-coloured, but

after a time they turn red; there may be some also which turn

white, and are called silver fish. There are also those which aremottled in various ways, red, white, and black. The taste of the

flesh is short (4 tuan) and tough. The Wu lei hsiang kan chihlsays: 'If gold fish &c. (as above, p. 6)'. There are also Red Fish;.

but it is not clear whether they are of this kind or not. I now

append them below.

"Addition: )J f Red Fish."I note that the Pao p'o tzi' says: 'The Red River rises in the~

Chung-ling hill in the Shang-lo District of the Metropolis (in Shan-

hsi) and flows into the Cho River. Red fish are produced in it. If

you watch them ten nights before the summer solstice, when the

fish swim at the side of the river there is sure to be a red light

shining upward like fire. If a man cuts one and smears the blood

on his feet, he can walk on the water' 2).

I) js 4 Po wu chih is a late reconstruction of a lost book of the third century.Li Shih-chen seems to mean that these fish with gold inside their heads were not 'gold

fish'. The Shu i chi is a reconstruction of a lost book by 3 J

Fang of the early sixth century. I have failed to find the passage in the text in the

3M S t;Han wei ts'ung shu. There seem to be hills named Lu both in Shan-

tung and in Ssu-ch'uan; but I cannot trace the M P'o-sai river, or even be sure-

of the true punctuation of the words.

2) This is reproduced in the Shu i chi (ed. Han wei ts'ung shu) c. 2b fol. igr0: "The7f it Tan shui (Red river) is at the foot of the Lung-ch'ao hill. In the

river are red fish. If one wishes to catch the fish, he watches for the fish to rise, when

there is red light like fire on the water. If he nets one and cuts it and smears the blood.

on his feet, he can walk on the water as if treading on dry land."


21/94

20 A. C. MOULE

"The Flesh (Nature and Taste): Sweet, salt, smooth, notpoisonous.

"Remedial Use: For Chronic Dysentery (Shih-ch6n)Prescription appended (new; one) 1):

"To check and control Chronic Dysentery: If the disease is

violent and the patient is likely to die, take one Gold-thread Ii

fish weighing one or two catties, as in ordinary cures(?); use-an

onion in salt sauce and be sure to add two or three candareensof powdered pepper. When it is well cooked place it in front of the

sick man. If, when he smells it, he wishes to eat, let him eat hisfill with the gravy as he pleases, and the root of the disease will

then. be removed. There is evidence of frequent cures. ([taken

from] I fang tse yao by Yang Kung.)'" )

5. "The bodies of gold fish are like gold; one name is 'fire fish'.

There are those with the whole body red, there are those with half

the body red, there are those with irregular red spots, there are

those with red lines on the back forming the patterns of the Dia-

grams, there are those with the head red and the tail white, there

are those with the scales (sic) red and the body white; colours and

forms every one different. In the cave at the foot of the Pi-chihill there are Gold-thread fish. In Chung-tu there are tortoiseshellfish with snow-white bodies and black spots, polished like varnish,

and like the markings of tortoiseshell, which are speciallybeautiful." 3)

i) The author gives an immense number of prescriptions taken from his predecessors,and adds many which he distinguishes as 'new'. These new prescriptions are not, as willbe seen, necessarily his own discoveries, even when (as here) he appends his name.

2) * m Pin ts'ao kang mu, c. I590 (ed. I658), c. 44 fol. 25v0. The author,4 Li Shih-chen, is said to have finished the book in I578, but it was not

published until after his death. I have not identified 4 Yang Kung or his4 j % I Jang tse yao.

3)


22/94

THE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH

2I

6. "Of Bowl Fish there are gold, jade, tortoiseshell, crystal,blue, sun and moon eyed. (They are different rom the breeds ofPool Fish. The specially trange varieties nclude he classes plum-blossom spots', 'hornbill ed', 'sky and land division', and cannot

, * * g ZLo*'t*t

T S At*gff i@

to*tff1'B*ge,*8

XE^ f hj(>+\Zest v ;H < S w q q

r 0

>

?.

:

_,

* i.E

.

.S

.d i

* 8 .

. ;; -^ ** .. 6 .

..

S -

. . .

1

. l

v\


23/94

2 A. C. MOULE

be exhaustively known; there are golden bands, there are silver

bands, and there are three tails, five tails, even seven tails. There

have first been breeders since the Sung. Su Tzu-chan [i.e. Tung-

p'o] had once read in Su Tzu-mei's poem on the Liu-ho pagoda,

'Along by the bridge I waited for the golden chi; To the end of the

day I lingered late alone', but did not understand the meaning of

this. Later, when he was Deputy at Ch'ien-t'ang he saw the gold

fish behind the pagoda. When he threw biscuits to bring them out,they did not eat but disappeared, and at last he understood the

meaning of 'to the end of the day I lingered late'. So he said, The

present is separated from Tzu-mei by forty years, but they are

swimming about as of old. This may be called long life indeed. He

also made the lines, 'I love the golden chi fish of Nan-p'ing; Coming

again and again I lean on the rail and scatter the crumbs of my

simple feast.' At the present time [gold fish] are universally kept inpleasure gardens for amusement. The EWan i harg choq fqs chih

by Ch'en Shan says: Those who speak say (as above on p. I4) . . .

five tails, these are all the product of fanciers in recent times. In

Hung-chih (I488-I505) they did not exist, and this is sufficient

proof of how things change with the times.) 1)"

7. "Gold Fish.

"Who dyed the silver scales, amber, rich ? The light quivers on

the drooping fins amid the reflected hibiscus. Where they leap in

the clear pool ripples are born; The green weeds divide forming a

frame for the gold within. The magic spring from the Bright Cave

bubbles along the land, The very colour of the sky, the vault of

heaven itself. All the fishes swimming aimlessly about together,

I) k * g 8 Ch'ien t'ang hsien chih, I609 (ed. I7I8), C. 8 fol. 27r. The

g M g fit e i Wan li hang chou fu chih was published about the yearI600, but I have not established the exact date, nor the dates of the author i *

Ch'en Shan. Cf. also p. I4 note 3, above.


24/94


Seem on tiptoe for a flight into the sky changed into red dragons. 1)"

8. "The Gold Fish Pool: Long ago in the Chin (III5-I234)there was the Fish-weed Pool ( 'Y- tsao ch'h). The

old Gazetteer says, Above the pool is a hall with a jasper pool atthe side. The foundations of the hall cannot now be traced. The

pool is deep. The inhabitants have bounded it with a bank; willows

droop over it. The yearly breeding of gold fish has become. a trade.

The breeds of fish:-the deep red are called gold, the lustrouswhite are called silver, snow-white bodies with ink spots or red

bodies with yellow spots are called tortoiseshell. If the fish is gold,

they prefer silver to encircle it; if the fish is silver, they prefer

gold to encircle it. And they distinguish between bands (kuan 'tubes') and hoops (i ku); a band, below the fins andabove the tail, is that which encircles the body; a hoop, not

reaching the fins, is that which encircles the tail. The fish include'strange breeds' (white with vermilion on the brow is called Crane

Pearl 2); vermilion body with white on the spine is called Silver

Saddle; vermilion spine with seven white spots is called Seven

Stars; white spine with eight red lines is called Eight Diagrams),and 'shrimp breeds' (such as Silver Eyes, Gold Eyes, Double

Rings, Four Tails). The breeds are really transformed by feedingwith the little insects from ditches. The fish first change to white,

Ku chin t'u shu chi chYng s.v.

-k fiAThe author is 7 Chu Chih-fan,

c. i6io. The translation is, I fear, at best only approximately correct.

2) i It seems to be possible that this is a slip for 9 O C o tingchu (cf. p. 2I above), or perhaps an abbreviation for j l* ho ting chu

ch:u, 'hornbill red pearl'.


25/94

24 A. C. MOULE

after white yellow, after yellow red; none- are hatched out red.

The diseases of fish are two, named lice and named plague (If

they are thin and have spots, they breed lice; the remedy is to

soak a new brick in dung and put it [into the water]. If the scales

open out as if falling off, this is plague; the remedy is to rub with

new blue calico). The [causes of] death of fish are three. If they

swallow soapy water they attain the first death; or the refuse

of olives, they attain the second death; or the juice of walnuthusks, they attain the third death. When the sky is about to rain

the fish come up to the surface with a smacking sound, and the

bottom of the water steams like hot soup. Every year after the

Cereal Rain (the - ji Ku yii festival, about 20 April) the

fish are sold. The larger go to other pools or ponds, the smaller go

to bowls or basins or glass jars, and can swim about actively all

day. Every year at the height of summer visitors bring wine-jarsand drink here, and toss in cakes and dumplings which the fish

gobble up noisily. When the large ones have devoured the dump-

lings at last they go. I note that gold fish had not been heard of

in ancient times. The Shu p'u says, Only the pool of the Liu-ho

Monastery at Hang-chou has them. So Tu Kung-pu (a slip for

Su Tzui-mei) wrote the lines, Along by the bridge I wait for the

golden chi; To the end of the day I linger late for them. Su Tzui-chan (i.e. Tung-p'o) says, I know the golden chi fish of Nan-p'ing.At the present time also people prefer the chi, and do not sell li.Yet no fish is so long-lived as the li. The golden ii are charming;

their bodies are compact and very large, and if one throws dump-

lings they do not respond, and they swim very slowly, nor do

they often leap out between the waves. All along the north sideof the Pool there are more gardens and pavilions than dwelling

houses, and to the south it faces the Altar of Heaven; a wideopen view all round. Every year on the [Tuan-]wu day they race


26/94

25I-IE BOOK OF VERMILION FIStI

horses here. tJj |* Hu Shih (c. I5I5) of Kuan-hsi i.e. Shan-hsi)says, On Tuan-wu hey race horses, a relic of the Hit-willow f theChin and Yuan dynasties (III5-I368). Hit-willow s now namedShoot-willow ).

"[Poem] by X mGy T'an Yuan-li of Q k Ching-ling,'Walking o the Gold Fish Pool on a fine evening':.....

"Song by I I t Wang Ying-i of s @ Ching-shan,

'Watching he fish at the Gold Fish Pool: . . . .)} ).

I) Hit-willow -(ch'i iu) or Shoot-willow (she liu) was a military exercise in which arider shot an arrow at a willow tree as he passed it at full gallop.

2)+9^ +k4mgSE0 *i'wo X t4MR * Ba g Z MR }* o + X 4 g o ^ i&P ffi oM A g iYk to#P 4g to k+m A Xo

mtcOW/*8 +cQn HXoWi9Mgo/'twgoR 10 Motffifi>oR ts XM t0tX 0A + t + M t i SlJ " f fR t to R T iX t o M2t*to+@*o } > A ^ o M t 4 X

to 94ggXo[A i stffi H * s ffi nm BOW+#iGyttHtMA#is

@ /N E oN }1>]t R to [ N * N ffi g N Xt1%]%k*fXz%oJ' mMIJ A0n MIJR0w g l J o * 8 o XMi*8*o m g -o HH B go[Xiii} M;tffiz*&*4&t"ffimEtgztffiaWgWtt]mE -o@#EM*o2# s o gAgoXHogt LA$oXRo

R Z o 2 RlJ o*toX8tsit8Mo8J8toX{ t to f g }S t # " C it S F o A 1X o',}S""toaSSo PpW4totAXok


27/94

6 A. C. MOULE

9. "Gold Fish: The names and varieties of fish are very many,but for garden ponds gold fish are regarded as the favourites,while blue ( * ch'ing, perhaps, dark' or 'black') Ssh and whitefish rank next to them. Only i Esh and chi fish are good at beingable to change colour, and the golden chi has long persisted

g R X 0 W + 93 t * M 0 g g H @ g * s +

sz;ttoitXit toteSf3&fiES01cR fiiXW o B + H o 9Q*g+ffi; 9o + t > R A 9 P

J;ftilOE9 XGXfiGofi>FtMIJ A ; o X 4 4 ilh4 n X ag}kioXt Xo4g g t t t0

i EeX0X+$+Ago *6 X S t

@t 0 k 4 j t ;% i;tO l Z l G i 0 J J I Elo Z ;t

W o +E X W P t B t o 0 W P o + t + PZrXxi S*+*m> ffiffianX

4 Xoa t MM8f f i t goS i NWgG h o s

9 e NJ ffi W O ;1t * M *s M g t # /*t X o % R S m S i S o t P aX m Q i Z l M o

i A *+ * + X b S o t X Q 4 Xg g w ti> ff i f f i 0 *gAg4RS0X Ill X Y W + 9 s i t f f iE iZi @ @ } A

M i B o tZ 2 142 p O J 8 o W % ffi e @ ; T > iw " wp1f lM gRB J f f i 0 4X t@ p t i o P & P X 9 @

X;Eo/e&SG'iBUtoW*^tAtGo

Zl X t t I t o 4 z Heg SFffi ,+^ A a ffX R t S0 Xb t T A s t a0

f;jt X ffi * 6 Ti ching ching tt lxeh, I635ed..750)>y

Liu T'ung and + + iE Yu I-cheng, c. 3 fol. 6r-7r. The Gold Fish Pool described

is the famous breeding establishment in the outer or 'Chinese' city of Peking.


28/94


beautiful. In antiquity there were none reared in earthenware ars,and not until the Sung did anyone use jars in which to rear them.Now they are frequently kept by people as ornaments, and the

fish themselves have become a kind, simply named 'gold fish'.

Generally speaking most of the coloured fish reared in pools and

ponds are of the li, chi, or blue classes of fish. But those which are

named gold fish are specially valued, and men would not put them

meanly into pools. Yet at ;5 M Shih-ch'eng 1) those who makea living by selling fish generally rear them in pools in order to

extend their life. But if fish are in contact with mud they will not

be red and bright. They must be reared in jars; and the best jarsare those which are pointed at the bottom and wide at the mouth.New jars which have not yet been filled with water should alwaysbe rubbed with raw yam, and then, after the water has been pouredin, they will grow moss and the water will be alive. In the veryhot periods of summer and autumn the water must be changedonce every other day, and then the fish will not be scalded and die,but will easily grow large. In readiness for the spawning timein the third month of Spring take several large male shrimpsto cover them, and then the young fish produced will all havethree or

five tails. But half of the shrimp's claws must be removedand then the fish will not be injured. When you see the malefish hurrying round the jar and snapping, that is the time when thefemale is dropping eggs. She lets the eggs fall on to the weed. Takethe weed into the sunshine to see if it has any eggs on it. They arethe size of grains of millet and look transparent like crystal. Takethis weed and put it by itself in a glazed earthenware basin, not

allowing more than from three to five fingers of water, and put itin a place thinly shaded by trees. If they are completely shadedthey will not hatch, nor will they hatch if they are exposed to

i) Perhaps a District in Chiang-hsi; but many places have, or have had, the name.


29/94

28 A. C. MOULE

fierce sunshine. After two or three days they will hatch out; but

the fry must not be in the same place as the large fish for fear

they may be eaten by them. After the fry are hatched out take

the yolk of a hard-boiled hen's egg or duck's egg crushed very

small with the fingers to feed them. Next, after ten days take some

of the little red insects which are found in the stagnant water of

canals to feed them; but it is necessary that the red insects shall

have been kept in clear water; and you must not give them toomany. After a hundred days or more the black ones will gradually

change to speckled white, and then gradually to pure [white];

or first change to pale yellow and then gradually to pure red;

and some of them will be particoloured,-all according to their

changes. The fish with three tails or five tails, without scales,

and with gold bands or silver bands are valued. Among the

famous sorts are Gold Helmets, Gold Saddles, Embroidered Cover-lets, down to Seal-red Heads, Wrap-head Reds, Joined Gills

Reds, Head-and-tail Reds, Hornbill Reds, Six Scales Reds, Jade

Girdles, Surrounding Spots, Purple Lips, Like the Eight Diagrams,

Like Dice Pips, which are much sought after. The eyes include

black eyes, snow eyes, pearl eyes, purple eyes, agate eyes, amber

eyes,-these differences. On the back of the body are four red

[lines] to twelve red [lines], or twelve white [lines]; and Piled

up Gold, Inlaid Jade, Falling Flowers, Flowing Water, Cut off

Short, Red Dust, Lotus Terrace, Eight Melon Seeds,-varieties

without number. To sum up, they have just been given names

according to men's fancy. When they are thoroughly domest-

icated the fish will not avoid the sight of men, and can be called

by clapping the fingers, and will come as soon as ever they cansee you. As to the method of rearing, if the fish turn white and

there is floating foam on the water, quickly change it for new

water for fear it may hurt the fish. And by taking banana leaves


30/94


and roots broken very small and throwing them into the water

it is possible to cure the fish. But if the fish are thin and come

out in white spots, called 'fish wind' 1), promptly throw in liquid-ambar bark or white poplar bark, and they will be healed. Or

take a new brick and bury it in dung and let it remain so for one

night; take it out and dry it and put it into the jar, and this also

may cure the wind. If there are frothy streaks in the water, or

if the fish eat pigeon's dung, they are sure quickly to die; so youmust use lumps of dung to cure them. If the fish fall ill through

eating willow catkins by mistake, they may also be cured by

the use of dung. Those that are offered for sale in Wu and Yiieh

(i.e. in Chiang-su and Che-chiang) are for the most part golden

li and golden chi, the largest being one or two feet long. These

are reared in ponds. According as they have swum in muddy

or clear water they are less or more valued as pets. Some alsoof the many-coloured variegated fish bred in the Phoenix Well

(,% ) g4 Feng huang ching) east of the Feng chenKuan inside the city of g Hsin-feng hsien in Chiang-hsi,

or in the Yu ch'iian by the West Lake in Che-chiang, or in the

Great Well 4 Ta ching) north of the Wu shan (.% It,in the city of Hang-chou), and in the Dragon Well which rises in

Ch'ang-hua, have bodies three or four feet long, many coloured

and mottled, with gold scales and bright eyes. If men are sent

there in time of drought to pray for rain, there is generally an

answer." 2)

It has seemed better to give these extracts entire in spite of

the many obvious borrowings and repetitions which they contain.

I) K feng, 'wind', is variously explained as madness or as paralysis.

2) j. * 1I A Pi ch'uan hita ching, i688 (ed. I783), c. 6 (on the rearing ofBirds, Animals, Fish, and Insects) fol 24r'-26r'. The author is

'jf Ch'en

Hao-tzu.


31/94

30 A. C. MOULE

It would be difficult to summarise them satisfactorily, and the

very repetitions may have a significance. Thus the constant quo-

tation of the lines by Su Tziu-mei or Tung-p'o make it fairly certain

that these are the most important allusions to gold fish to be found

in classic literature. Of special interest perhaps is the connexion

of gold fish with the dragon and prayers for rain, persisting from

Tu Fu in the eighth century') to Ch'en Hao-tzui in i688, and

enshrined in the use of dragon as an element in the names ofseveral varieties, as will be seen, from the eighteenth century to

the present time.

The medieval Western travellers who visited China do not speak

of gold fish, though there is little doubt, as has been shown above,

that gold fish were domesticated in Peking before the end of the

thirteenth century and so may have been seen by Marco Polo 2)

and by the early Franciscan missionaries. Nor, apparently, are

they mentioned by the first Portuguese traders or Jesuit mis-

sionaries in the sixteenth or early seventeenth century.

The earliest Western account of gold fish which I have happened

to find is by Martini (I6I4-I66I), written perhaps from observations

made when he was stationed at Hang-chou (I646-I650) and was

working there and up the Ch'ien-t'ang river as far as Lan-ch'i.He writes, "The hill of Ch'ien-ch'ing (Cinking, see p. I2 above)

is near to Ch'ang-hua (Changhoa), and there is a lake there which,

though not among the largest, yet covers quite two hundred

acres of land. It is famous and renowned for the little gilded fish

which are caught there, which the Chinese have for this reason

i) The poem by Tu Fu quoted on p. 5 above ends with the line m* ,; X

4' W j* "Though it is not yet become a dragon yet it has divinity". - withreference to the great fish with golden scales.

2) Marco Polo mentions fish kept in the lakes in the Palace grounds both at Cambaluc

and Quinsai; but in the first place certainly, and in the second probably, he means fish

kept to be eaten. cf. Moule & Pelliot, Marco Polo I, pp. 2I0, 338.


32/94


named chin-yii, because the skin glitters, being somehow inter-

woven with threads of gold-the whole back sprinkled as it were

with gold dust. They are no longer than a finger, and have a tail

of three lobes, sometimes of two; and at times it is undivided

(simple) and rather broad. They are a strange sight. The Chinese

make much of them, and keep them with great care in their houses

and pleasure-gardens, in specially made vessels. The great lords

sometimes feed them with their own hands, and often play with

them, as if the fish knew their masters and wished to show the

pleasure and entertainment they received when they were honoured

by their presence. One of these little fish is sometimes worth quite

two or three gold crowns, especially if it has all the good points

which the Chinese wish." 1)

The independent account of gold fish by Louis le Comte S.J. is

as follows: "I shall confirm to you, what possibly you may haveread in the Relations (i.e. perhaps Thevenot, as above) touching

the Fish they call the Golden and Silver Fish that are found in

divers Provinces, which are a great Beauty and Ornament to the

Courts and Gardens of great Persons. They are commonly of a

fingers length, and of a proportionable hickness; the Male is of a

most delicate red, from the head to the middle of the Body, and

further; the rest, together with the Tail, is gilded; but with such aglittering, and burnisht Gold, that our real Gildings cannot come

near it. The Female is white, its Tail, nay and one part of its Body,

perfectly washt over with Silver; the Tail of both of them is not

even and flat as that of other Fish, but fashioned like a Nosegay,

thick and long, which gives a particular Grace to this pretty Animal,

and sets it off, being besides perfectly well proportioned.

i) Description Geographique de l'Empire de la Chine par le Pere Martin Martinius S.I.

(pp. 1-2I6 in [M. Thevenot] Relations de divers Voyages curieux . . . 3me Partie, Paris

I666), p. I40.


33/94

32 A. C. MOULE

"Those who would breed them, ought to have great Care, for

they are extraordinary tender, and sensible of the least Injuries of

the Air. They put them into a great Basin, such as are in Gardens,very deep and large; at the bottom of which they are wont to place

an Earthern Pot turned upside down, full of Holes on the sides, that

they may retire into it when it is very hot Weather, and by that

means shelter themselves from the Sun. They likewise throw upon

the Surface of the Water some particular Herbs that keep alwaysgreen, and maintain the coolness. This Water is to be changed two

or three times a Week, yet so that fresh Water may be put in,

according as the Basin is emptied, which must never be left dry.

If one be obliged to remove the Fish from one Vase to another,

great care must be taken not to touch them with the Hand; all

those that are touched dye quickly after, or shrivel up; you must

for that purpose make use of a little Thred Purse, fastned at theupper end of a Hoop, into which they are insensibly ingaged;

when they are once got into it of themselves, one must take heed

of hurting them, and be sure to hold them still in the first, which

empties but slowly, and gives time to Transport them to the

other Water. Any great noise, as of a Cannon, or of Thunder, too

strong a smell, too violent a motion, are all very hurtful to them,

yea, and sometimes occasions their dying; as I have observed at

Sea every time they discharged the Cannon, or melted Pitch and

Tar l): Besides, they live almost upon nothing; those insensible

Worms that are bread in the Water, or those small earthly Particles

that are mixt with it, suffice in a manner to keep them alive. They

do, notwithstanding, throw in little Balls of Past now and then;

i) Le Comte's only homeward-bound voyage was on an English ship in I69I-2 (cf. A.Van den Wyngaert Sinica Franciscana IV, p. 522-3); and this remark seems to show that

he had witnessed the export of gold fish at that date. But whether they were destined to

India, St Helena, or England, and whether they survived the voyage, there is nothing

to show. See also p. 37 below.


34/94


but there is nothing better than a Wafer, which steep't, makes

a kind of Pap, of which they are extream greedy, which indeed

is very suitable to their natural Delicacy and Tenderness. In hot

Countries they multiply very much, provided care be taken to

remove their Eggs, which swim upon the Water, which the Fish

most commonly eat: They place them in a particular Vase exposed

to the Sun, and there they preserve them till the heat hatcheth

them; the Fish come out of a black colour, which some of them

keep ever after, but it is changed by little and little in other Col-

ours 1), into Red, White, Gold, and Silver, according to their

different Kind: The Gold and Silver, begins at the extremity of

the Tail, and expand themselves somewhat more or less, according

to their particular Disposition." 2)

The next notice of gold fish which I have found is in a long

letter from the Jesuit Giovanni Laureati (i666-1727) to Baron deZea, written from Fu-chien and dated 26 July I7I4. It is as follows:

"The strangest fish beyond question is that which is called chin-

yii or gold fish. It is kept in little ponds with which the pleasure-

houses of the Princes and of the great Lords of the Court are adorn-

ed, or in broad deep bowls with which the courts of the houses are

often furnished. In these bowls they put only the smallest fish

which can be found; the smaller and more delicate they are, the

more beautiful they appear. They are of a soft and quiet red, and

as it were powdered with gold dust, especially towards the tail,

which has two, or three, points. Some are seen also of a silvery

whiteness, and others which are white with scattered spots of

red; and all are wonderfully lively and active. They love to play

i) For "Colours" we should perhaps understand some such word as specimens. Theoriginal (in Du Halde) is dans les autres.

2) Memoirs and Observations . . . . made in a late Journey through the Empire of China

by Louis le Comte Jesuit, translated from the Paris edition (I696); second edition, London,

I698, pp. II3-II4.

T'oung Pao, XXXIX 3


35/94

34 A. C. MOULE

on the surface of the water. But their small size makes them s&

sensitive to the least injuries from the air, or to even slightly

rough shaking of the bowl, that they die easily and in great numbers.

Those which are kept in ponds are of different sizes, and are trained

to come to the surface of the water at the sound of a clapper which

the man who brings them their food rattles. The wonderful thing

is that it is claimed that there is no need to give them anything in

the winter, if one wishes to keep them in good condition. It is,

certain that they leave them without food for the three or four

months that the cold weather lasts. On what do they live? It is

not easy to guess. One may conjecture that those which spend the

winter under the ice find in the roots, of which the bottom of the

pond is full, either little worms or other suitable food for their

nourishment. But those which are taken from the courts and

kept in a room for the winter, without anyone troubling to providefor their living, do not fail, when towards Spring they are put

back in their old bowl, to play with the same vigour and activity

as they did the year before ... . Besides the gold fish which I

have described to you there is another kind which closely resembles

it in size, in activity, in colour, and lastly in shape. This fish is

called Hua-hsien[yii] from the name of the little town of Ch'ang-

hua hsien, in the jurisdiction of Hang-chou and situated on the30.23 degree of latitude. Near this town is a little lake which

provides the fish of which I am speaking. Its scales are of a trans-

parent pale yellow, but their colour is much enhanced (relevent)

by the reddish spots with which it is sprinkled over. It is of about

the same length as the gold fish and its ways are almost the same,

but its price is very different because of its extraordinary rarity.

They place it in a bowl where they take great care to give it a

certain amount of food every day. The bowl must be covered in the

winter, but a little opening is left, either to change the water, or


36/94


to admit fresh air, or to allow the warmth of the room where it is toenter. One would say that this fish knew the person whose businessit is to bring it food, so quick is it to come up from the depth of the

water as soon as it knows he is come. I have known very great Lords

take delight in feeding it with their own hand and spend two or

three hours watching the agility of its movements and of its various

little games. This fish is supposed to be very prolific. When the

spawn is seen floating one ceases to change the water in the bowl,and collects the spawn with every possible precaution and keeps

it carefully, and the heat of the weather never fails to make the

eggs hatch." 1)

Du Halde (I673-I743), whose book is a compilation, need not

be quoted in full. Some of his paragraphs agree closely with Le

Comte or with Laureati, and some seem to be based on Martini.

He was specially surprised to learn that the fish were not fed inwinter, and copies Laureati to that effect almost word for word.

But when he comes to the lake near the Ch'ien-ch'ing hill, though

he seems to have seen Laureati's more plausible account and

takes perhaps some details (e.g. the latitude) from it, he prefers

to follow Martini, with some slight embellishment: "These fish,

or at least the prettiest, are caught in a little lake in the Province

of Che-chiang near the small town of Ch'ang-hua n the jurisdiction

of Hang-chou, and at the foot of a hill named Ch'ien-ch'ing (Tsien

king) situated on the 30 degree 23 minutes of latitude. This lake

is small, and it is clear that it is not the source of all the gold fish

which are seen in all the Provinces of China, as in those of Kuang-

tung and of Fu-chien, where these fish can easily be kept and

bred." 2)i) Lettres ddi/. et cur., XXIX, I773, pp. 64-67, 70-72 (French version of Laureati's

Italian).

2) J. B. du Halde S. J. Descriptiont . . . . de l'Empire de la Chinte, Paris, 735, tome I,

p. 36. There is a brief mention of gold fish on p. I74 also.


37/94

36 A. C. MOULE

In his second tome Du Halde has an important addition to make.

He begins, "Father le Comte, who has given a description of them,adds to what we have said some details which I must not omit",and then gives the original French of the passage of which I havegiven the old English version above. He proceeds: "New know-

ledge obtained from Chinese who deal in these little fish, making

their livelihood by breeding and selling them, enables me to make

some observations here."i. Though very commonly they are not more than a finger's

length, yet there are some which are as long and as stout as the

largest herrings.

"2. It is not the colour, red or white, which distinguishes the male

from the female. The females are known by various white spots

which they have about the ears and towards the little fins which

are near them; and the males, because they have these placesbright and shining. [But see note on p 67.]

"3. Though very generally they have the tail in the form of a

'nosegay', yet many have it exactly like those of common fish.

"4. Besides the little balls of paste with which they are fed, they

are given the yolk of a hen's egg boiled hard, and lean pork dried in

the sun and minced very finely. Sometimes they throw water-

snails into the bowl where they are kept, and the slime of these

sticking to the sides of the bowl is a great treat for these little

fish, which vie one with another eagerly to suck it up. Little reddish

worms which are found in the water of certain pools are also afavourite food for them.

"5. They rarely multiply when they are kept in bowls, because

they have too little space. If one wishes them to breed he mustput them in ponds, where the water is alive and in some parts deep.

"6. When one has drawn water from a well to fill the bowl wherethe fish are, it must first be left to settle for five or six hours;


38/94

THE BOOK OF 'VERMILION FISH 37

otherwise it would be too hard, and would do them harm.

"7. If one sees that the fish are spawning and laying eggs, which

happens about the beginning of May, he must spread weed over the

surface of the water. The eggs stick to the weed, and when he sees

that the spawning is ended, that is to say that the males no longer

chase the females, he must take the fish out of the bowl to transport

them into another; and expose the bowl full of spawn to the bright

sunshine for three or four days. And after forty or fifty days, when

the fry have a perceptible form, he must change the water.

"These observations would be useful if some day someone

thought of carrying some of these little gold fish to Europe, as the

Dutch have carried some of them to Batavia." 1)

The passage about sea fish, especially those round the island of

Ts'ung-ming, which precedes these additional notes on gold fish, is

taken directly from a letter by Father Jacquemin in Lettres edif. etcurieuses, XI, I7I5; but I have not traced the source of these seven

observations. The seventh, besides being in direct contradiction to

the fifth, seems to be rather confused. It is, at least, more usual

to remove not the parent fish but the weed with the spawn attached

to it from the breeding bowl to a separate shallow pan, where the

fry are hatched out by the warmth of the sun.

In le Comte's original French, which is known to me only through

this quotation, the only addition of any interest is in the passage

about the fish's sensitiveness to noise or smell. It reads, "comme je

l'ai souvent remarque sur mer ou nous en portions, toutes les fois

qu'on tiroit le canon, ...." Whether le Comte had tried to carry

gold fish home with him to France or not, du Halde's last paragraph

seems to show that he, or his source, had heard of no attempt to

introduce them to Europe. If it is his own remark, it was written in

France, perhaps about I730, for in his Preface to Lettres e'dif. et

i) J. B. du Halde Description . . . . de la Chine, tome II, pp. I40-I42.


39/94

38 A. C. MOULE

curieuses XX,I73I,

he writes that he had been engagedon his

great book for some years (depuis quelques anne'es).

When we pass from China to Europe the first possible mention

of gold fish seems to be by Pepys, who wrote in May i665:

"28th. (Lord's day.).... Thence home and to see my lady Pen,

where my wife and I were shown a fine rarity: of fishes kept in a

glass of water, that will live so for ever; and finely marked they are,

being foreign." 1) The footnote, "Gold fish introduced from China",is not supported by any evidence, and if these foreign fishes were

really gold fish they evidently failed to live for ever, for gold fish

are not heard of again in Europe before the eighteenth century,

when they seem to be mentioned and drawn by James Petiver

(I663-I7I8), naturalist and botanist of Aldersgate Street. In his

Catalogus classicus vol. II, MDCCXI, p. 2, is the entry: "i86

Piscis Chin. cauda argentea 78.6 I87... aurea 78.7", and in his

Gazophylacii Decas 6, 7, 8, not dated, p. 8 col. 2: "Tab. 78....

6. China Silver-tail, Cat. i86. 7. China Gold-tail, Cat. I87. Fish

brought thence alive." 2) These cross-references, with the an-

i) The Diary of Samuel Pepys M.A. F..S...S . transcribed by Mynors Bright ...

with Lord Bra ybrooke's notes edited with additions by Henry B. Wheatley F.S.A. vol. IV,

I894, p. 420. Lord Braybrooke's first edition, I825, vol. I, p. 34I, omits "home and" and

the footnote. I owe this reference to Mr G. F. Hervey.

2) This is not the place to give a detailed collation of Petiver's works; but some account

of them may be useful. Jacobi Petiveri opera historiam naturalem spectantia were published

in two folio volumes in 1764, forty-six years after Petiver's death. These appear to consist

of the remainders of various sheets (some in type and some engraved) printed and, pre-

sumably, published at various dates in Petiver's lifetime, bounld up together in two volumlies

with new titles and sold as one work in 1764. For the present purpose it is enough to say

that vol. I consists of Catalogus classicus 1, pp. I-4, 1709; Cat. class. II, pp. 1-4, I7II;

Gazophylacii Decas 6-io, pp. I-I2, undated; Contents of Plates CI-CLV, pp. i-Io, undated;

Plates I-C, IOI-I56, undated; etc. On the top margin of Plate ioi in the Cam-bridge copy

"this including I56 new" is written in pencil. There is a third, 8vo, volume which is also

composite, the two titles dated I695 anld I702, aiid the sheets variously dated fromll i6g95

to I706; this last (I706) being the date of A Classical and Topical Catalogue of Decades

i-5, which ends (p. 94) with an aninounicement of vol. II (Decades 6-io) of which "I lhave3o Tables [presumably 5i-8o] ready to deliver to each Person? that deposits a Guinea".


40/94


nouncement of I706, probably show that Plate 78, which includes

the two fish (perhaps the first pictures of gold fish, if gold fish

they are, published in Europe), was already engraved in I706, or at

least by I7II. The engraving and, perhaps, the drawing was by

Sutton Nicholls (/1. I700-I740) a well known engraver who lived

near Petiver in Aldersgate Street. Petiver, who received many

specimens from Correspondents abroad, does not say whither

these fish had been "brought thence alive", nor whether he hadseen them, alive or dead, himself; but those who assume that he

had himself received them alive may well be right. And indeed

the strange names, "silver-tail" and "gold-tail", may tempt one

to guess that these fish may have been brought home alive by the

German naturalist Kaempfer who returned from the East to

Holland about the year I693 and thus describes the gold fish:

"Kingio, the Gold-Fish, is a small fish seldom exceeding a fingerin length, red, with a beautiful shining, yellow or gold-colour'd

tail, which in the young ones is rather black. In China and Japan,

and almost all over the Indies, this fish is kept in ponds, and fed

with flies before their wings come out. Another kind hath a silver-

colour'd tail." 1)

The sheets of the I764 vol. II, which does not here concern us, are mostly dated I7I5,i6, or I7, but one of the last ("The following Catalogue") s dated I693. The best collationsof the whole work known to me are in the catalogues of The Books, etc. isn he British Mu-

seum (Nat. Hist.) vol. IV, I9I3, and of the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris. The general

catalogue of the British Museum gives the I764 issue without indication of how the two

volumes are made up.i) E. Kaempfer, History of Japan, I727, p. I37. The unpublished German original

of this in the British Museum (Sloane 3060, fol. io8) reads: Kingjo, goldfisch, ein fischlein

finger langte, roht und am schwantze gold farbig und glantzende, und alss er noch jung

ist, schwartzlich. wirdt in Sina und Japan, itzo auch in Indien in wasser Kummen unter-

halten, mussen mit jungen muicken die noch ungeflugelt, gefuttert werden. Es gibt eineandere art welche silber farbig ist.

It will be seen that the tails are less prominent in the German than in the English, and

as a fact Kaempfer does not seem to have been one of Petiver's many correspondents.

I am obliged to the Master of Christ's College for help in this point.


41/94

40 A. C. MOULE

The efforts of scientific naturalists to fix the date of the first

introduction of gold fish into England have been involved in a series

of strange accidents. Bloch says that they were first introduced in

I6ii, and had become common in I728 1). But he is explicitly

quoting Thomas Pennant's British Zoology IJl, I776, p. 374, and

Pennant on that page says not i6ii but "about I69I", and it may

be regarded as certain that Bloch's I6ii is a misprint. Pennant

in his turn gives no authority for his I69I; but Mr George Herveyhas shown conclusively that it must have been Edwards, who

claims Petiver as authority for his own "about Anno I69I",

having by some slip changed Petiver's I7II into I691 2).

Thus all seventeenth century dates, with the possible exception

of Pepys's I665, must go, and Petiver's brief "Fish brought thence

alive" is the first known evidence of Chinese gold fish seen alive,

as is generally assumed, in England 3).

For the first serious account of the introduction of gold fish

into England and Europe we are indebted again to George Edwards,

who writes in the same place: "They were not generally known in

England till the year I728, when a large Number of them were

brought over in the Houtghton Indiaman, Captain Philip Worth,

i) M. E. Bloch Ichthyologie ou Hist. Nat.. .. des Poissons, Part III, I786, (La Do-rade Chinoise, pp. III-II5, P1. 93, 94) p. II3: I1 fut apporte en Angleterre l'an I6ii, & eni

1728, il y etoit deja generalement connu.

2) George Edwards A Natural History of Birds Part IV, I75I, P. 209: "The first Ac-

count of these Fishes being brought to England may be seen in Petiver's Works, published

about Anno I69I. See his Catalogue, i86, Piscis Chin. Caudd argentea, Plate 78, Fig. 6.

and Catalogue I87, Piscis Chin. Cauda aurea, Plate 78, Fig. 7." We know that Petiver's

Catalogus classicus is in fact dated MDCCXI (see p. 38 above), and Mr Hervey has pointed

out how easily MDCCXI may become MDCXCI (I69I) - The Aquarist Dec. I946, p. 286.

3) In a valuable but appareintly unfininished article entitled "The Goldfish" (pp.

4I-53, III-I23 in The Hong Kong Naturalist, VIII, I937), of which I did not hear until

my own work was finished, R. A. Pereira writes on p. 4I that there is "ample proof to

show that goldfish were reared in Enigland in the seventeenth century." No proof is quoted;

and in view of the silence of Petiver, Pennant, Edwards, Baster, and others it is possible

that the seventeenth cerntury is ineant for the seventeen-hundreds or eighteenth century.


42/94

THE BOOK OF VERMILION FISH 4I

Commander, & presented by him and Manning Lethieullier, Esq;

to Sir Matthew Decker: Since which time they have been propagatedin Ponds by several curious Gentlemen, in the neighbourhood of

London, .... they have been propagated & greatly increased

in the Island of St. Helena; from whence they are now brought

by all our India Ships that touch there .. . Those propagatedwith us are generally of a deader Colour than what are brought

from China, or St. Helena." He says too that "the late Duke ofRichmond [Charles Lennox, I70I-I750] had a large Chinese earthen

Vessel full of these Fish, brought alive to England".

Job Baster (I7II-I775), an eminent physician and naturalist ofZeeland in Holland, and author of what is, perhaps, the best

monograph on gold fish to appear in Europe until at least late in

the nineteenth century, has copied Edwards's account of the

introduction of the fish into England with two small additions 1).He writes (p. 8I): "Some of these little fish were brought over by

the English from China to the Island of St Helena, and thence in

I728 were the first conveyed to England (zyn de eersten in Engeland

gebragt) by Philip Worth, . . . they have been bred in England,

where they were put in ponds, and in this way (having also been

sent to other parts of Europe) they are become well known."

There is however some difficulty about this story of the introduction

of gold fish in I728. Edwards and Baster agree, as has been seen,that the fish were brought to England by Philip Worth, captain

i) The referenices are to the Latini version of "Natuurkundige Beschryving vain den

Kin-yu, of Goud-vis." in Verhandelietgen uitgegeeven door de Hollandsche Maatsckappye der

Weetentschappent, te Haarlem. Vol. VII Part I, Haarlem, I763, pp. 215-246, with onie folded

coloured and gilt Plate. This paper seems to have been written late in I762, and was re-

printed in Latin in Jobi Basteri Med. Doct., Acad. Caes., Societat. Reg. Lond., et Holland.

Socii Opuscula Subseciva, &c. Tom. II Harlemi, I765, pp. 78-93, De Kin-yu, sive CarpioneAurato., with the same Plate, more brightly coloured but without the gold. My trans-

lation is from the Latin, with some variations translated from the Dutch inserted in brac-

kets, or sometimes the actual Dutch inserted for confirnmation or variation of the Latin.


43/94

42 A. C. MOULE

of the Houghton, in I728; Baster adding that they came from

St Helena, and Edwards saying explicitly that they came "in

the Houghton". But from the List of the Marine Records of the

late East India Company, I896, we learn that the Houghton, then

commanded by Edward Gibson, left England in I724 and re-

turned in I726 (the exact dates not known, because the log is lost).

Philip Worth, in command of the Townshend, left on 29 September

I725 and returned on 2 June I727; and, having now been trans-ferred to the Houghton, he sailed on 24 September 1728 and

returned on 26 June I730, and again on 2I September I73I to

return on 26 May I733. It is thus practically certain that no fish

were brought to England in the Houghton, or by Worth in any

ship, in I728; and we must suppose that Edwards and Baster,

though they seem likely to have had access to firsthand nformation,

were both mistaken. The year, however, we may suppose to beapproximately correct.

In a footnote to his Dutch edition Baster says that he thinks

that gold fish first reached Holland in I753 or I754, for the ponds

of "Wel.Ed.Geb. Heer van Rhoon" and "Heer Clifford"; but in the

Latin he omits the dates, saying that "Comes Bentinkius" and

"Dominus Clifford" were the first to keep them, "but, as far as I

know, they (the fish) have not yet bred". He then proceeds to

give an account of his own fish a

book of vermilion fish

Documents