Many use to break holes to relieve the fish, and, as they think, give them fresh air; some have put dung bound up together into the holes, as if the warmth of that keeping the hole open would preserve the fish; but these ways, and all others that I have heard of, except taking out the fish, are mere vanities. I have cut many holes, and large ones, and employed men to take out the ice, and keep them open, but to no advantage. One thing appeared very oddly to me, when I took that course. Many of the fish in a large moat had gathered together in a corner obverted to the South, where the ground rose under an high bank, to a shoal-water. These fish, by their motion and heat, together with the sun’s heat, that was strongest there, kept the water from freezing, and I could plainly see every fish, great and small. There were carp, pike, perch, eels, and fry in abundance, collected as if it had been a general counsel of all the orders of fish, met to consider what was to be done in that extremity, very diverting to observe. But to leave conceits, and come to the only expedient which I have found effectual to save the fish in this case; and that is, to set great tubs or fats full of water in some outhouse, not far from a fire; and as fast as the fish appear, take them out, and put them there; and from thence you may convey them in a basket to your great waters, where you may make an hole at about eight feet deep, and putting the fish in, preserve them; or if you please, you may keep them there, freshening the water every twelve hours, until the frost breaks, and put them into their own houses again. You may plainly perceive how the fish, though stunned and numb with the frost, coming into the fat, will by degrees recover, and be perfectly well again; and thus you may keep them five weeks, or longer, if the frost continues. I have gone farther: sometimes fish have been to all appearance dead, others frozen and inveloped in ice, yet by this method I have preserved them; for heating water, and putting it into the fat, until I brought the water there to a Midsummer heat, and then I have put such fish in, with their shell of ice upon them, and in six or seven hours the ice was gone, and the fish alive and well; and so I have delivered them to my great waters, brisk as any. This may seem strange, but it is most true, and to be attested, if need were; therefore in frost use this and no other means, for all else will prove but labour in vain.