Page:The Book of the Aquarium and Water Cabinet.djvu/16

6 a travelling show containing an asthmatic lion, a seedy cockatoo, and a pair of snakes that are hourly stirred up with a long pole. Hence such a term could never convey the very special idea of a vessel containing such specimens as form the stock of the aquarium. When this was felt, the affix aqua was added, to convey the idea of the watery medium in which the specimens are immersed, and hence we had aqua-vivarium a compound of too clumsy a character to remain long in use. It is the water that gives the collection its special character; and water always reminds us of old Aquarius, who treats us to an annual drenching from his celestial watering-pot. Aquarius triumphed, and the pretty prison in which his cool companions of the sign Pisces were doomed to be confined acquired his name; and, since it is better to follow than to oppose usage, we leave the philological part of the question to the learned, and adopt Aquarium as the name of our collection.

The Object of the Aquarium is to enable us to study the economy and derive pleasure from the contemplation of various forms of aquatic life, contributed by the lakes, the mountain rills, and the “resounding sea.” Collections of objects that inhabit rivers and lakes are of course called Fresh-water aquaria; those that owe their origin to the sea are called Marine aquaria. A more simple name for the first would be River aquarium, which I humbly suggest it shall in future be called. But an aquarium is not a mere cabinet of specimens; it is a water garden in which we cultivate choice plants, and it is also in some sort a menagerie, in which we see living creatures of