Goldfish

The goldfish (Carassius auratus) is a freshwater fish in the family Cyprinidae of order Cypriniformes. It is commonly kept as a pet in indoor aquariums, and is one of the most popular aquarium fish. Goldfish released into the wild have become an invasive pest in parts of North America and Australia.

Quotes

• ’Twas on a lofty vase’s side,
  Where China’s gayest art had dyed
    The azure flowers that blow;
  Demurest of the tabby kind,
  The pensive Selima reclined,
    Gazed on the lake below.
  Her conscious tail her joy declared;
  The fair round face, the snowy beard,
    The velvet of her paws,
  Her coat, that with the tortoise vies,
  Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,
    She saw; and purr’d applause.
  Still had she gazed; but ’midst the tide
  Two angel forms were seen to glide,
    The Genii of the stream:
  Their scaly armour’s Tyrian hue
  Thro’ richest purple to the view
    Betray’d a golden gleam.
  The hapless Nymph with wonder saw:
  A whisker first and then a claw,
    With many an ardent wish,
  She stretch’d in vain to reach the prize.
  What female heart can gold despise?
    What Cat’s averse to fish?
  Presumptuous Maid! with looks intent
  Again she stretch’d, again she bent,
    Nor knew the gulf between.
  (Malignant Fate sat by, and smiled.)
  The slipp’ry verge her feet beguiled,
    She tumbled headlong in.
  Eight times emerging from the flood
  She mew’d to ev’ry wat’ry god,
    Some speedy aid to send.
  No Dolphin came, no Nereid stirr’d:
  Nor cruel Tom, nor Susan heard.
    A Fav’rite has no friend!
  From hence, ye Beauties, undeceived,
  Know, one false step is ne’er retrieved,
    And be with caution bold.
  Not all that tempts your wand’ring eyes
  And heedless hearts, is lawful prize;
    Nor all that glisters, gold.
  • Thomas Gray, "On a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes"
  • First published, anonymously, in Dodsley's A Collection of Poems by Several Hands (1748); addressed to a cat belonging to Horace Walpole. See G. G. Falle, ed. "Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat Drowned in a Tub of Goldfishes", Representative Poetry Online

• The tortured mullet served the Roman’s pride
  By darting round the crystal vase, whose heat
  Ensured his woe and beauty till he died:
  These unharm’d gold-fish yield as rich a treat;
  Seen thus, in parlour-twilight, they appear
  As though the hand of Midas, hovering o’er,
  Wrought on the waters, as his touch drew near,
  And set them glancing with his golden power,
  The flash of transmutation! In their glass
  They float and glitter, by no anguish rackt;
  And, though we see them swelling as they pass,
  ’Tis but a painless and phantasmal act,
  The trick of their own bellying walls, which charms
  All eyes——themselves it vexes not, nor harms.
  • Charles Tennyson Turner, "On a Vase of Gold Fish" (1868); variant entitled "A Picture of Goldfish in a Glass Bowl" reported in Tennyson and his Friends (1911), p. 61:
    As though King Midas did the surface touch,
    Constraining the clear water to their change
    With shooting motions and quick trails of light.
    Now a rich girth and then a narrow gleam,
    And now a shaft and now a sheet of gold.