print them at my own charge. Pray what do you call this hill we came down?

Pisc. We call it Hanson Toot.

VIAT. Why, farewell, Hanson Toot! I'll no more on thee: I'll go twenty miles about first: Puh! I sweat that my shirt sticks to my back.

Pisc. Come, sir, now we are up the hill; and now how do you?

VIAT. Why, very well, I humbly thank you, sir; and warm enough, I assure you. What have we here, a church? As I'm an honest man, a very pretty church? Have you churches in this country, sir?

PISC. You see we have: but had you seen none, why should you make that doubt, sir?

VIAT. Why, if you will not be angry, I'll tell you; I thought myself a stage or two beyond Christendom.

Pisc. Come, come, we'll reconcile you to our country before we part with you, if showing you good sport with angling will do it.

VIAT. My respect to you, and that together, may do much, sir; otherwise, to be plain with you, I do not find myself much inclined that way.

Pisc. Well, sir, your raillery upon our mountains has brought us almost home; and look you where the same river of Dove has again met us to bid you welcome, and to invite you to a dish of trouts to-morrow.

VIAT. Is this the same we saw at the foot of PenmenMaure? It is a much finer river here.

But look

Pisc. It will appear yet much finer to-morrow. you, sir, here appears the house, that is now like to be inn, for want of a better.

your

VIAT. It appears on a sudden, but not before 'twas looked

very signal instance. In the service of the English ambassador, then resident, was a woman of Hindostan, a laundress, whose frequent practice it was to scold, brawl, and rail, from sunrising to sunset. This formidable shrew did Coriate one day undertake to scold with, in her own language; and succeeded so well in the attempt, that, by eight of the clock in the morning, he had totally silenced her, leaving her not a word to speak. Further it appears, that he was a zealous champion for the Christian religion against the Mahometans and the Pagans, in the defence whereof he sometimes risked his life. He died of the flux, occasioned by drinking sack, at Surat, in 1617: having published his European travels in a quarto volume, which he called his "Crudities;" and to this circumstance the passage in the text is a manifest allusion.-H.

for; it stands prettily, and here's wood about it too, but so young, as appears to be of your own planting.

Pisc. It is so; will it please you to alight, sir? and now permit me, after all your pains and dangers, to take you in my arms, and to assure you, that you are infinitely welcome. VIAT. I thank you, sir, and am glad with all my heart I am here; for, in downright truth, I am exceeding weary.

PISC. You will sleep so much the better; you shall presently have a light supper, and to bed. Come, sirs, lay the cloth, and bring what you have presently, and let the gentleman's bed be made ready in the meantime, in my father Walton's chamber; and now, sir, here is my service to you, and once more welcome.

VIAT. Ay marry, sir, this glass of good sack has refreshed me, and I'll make as bold with your meat, for the trot has got me a good stomach.

Pisc. Come, sir, fall to, then, you see my little supper is always ready when I come home; and I'll make no stranger of you.

VIAT. That your meal is so soon ready is a sign your servants know your certain hours, sir; I confess I did not expect it so soon; but now 'tis here, you shall see I will make myself no stranger.

PISC. Much good do your heart, and I thank you for that friendly word: and now, sir, my service to you in a cup of More-Lands ale: for you are now in the More-Lands, but within a spit and a stride of the Peak; fill my friend his glass. VIAT. Believe me, you have good ale in the More-Lands, far better than that at Ashborn.*

PISC. That it may soon be: for Ashborn has, which is a kind of riddle, always in it the best malt, and the worst ale in England. Come, take away, and bring us some pipes, and a bottle of ale, and go to your own suppers. Are you for this diet, sir?

* The name of this pretty town is variously written,-Ashborn, Ashbourn, Ashborne. The latter is the modern way of spelling it.-ED.

† Such is not the case now, but quite the reverse. Ashborne ale is as good as that of any other town in England. Each publican brews his own ale; hence a competition that leads to excellency. It is the same at Nottingham; and I class amongst the best, pleasantest, and purest ales sold publicly those of the above towns. The cellars in each are merely excavations in rock and sandstone, and are peculiarly adapted for preserving and improving malt liquors.-ED.

VIAT. Yes, sir, I am for one pipe of tobacco; and I perceive yours is very good by the smell.

But,

PISC. The best I can get in London, I assure you." sir, now you have thus far complied with my designs, as to take a troublesome journey into an ill country, only to satisfy me; how long may I hope to enjoy you?

VIAT. Why truly, sir, as long as I conveniently can; and longer, I think, you would not have me.

PISC. Not to your inconvenience by any means, sir: but I see you are weary, and therefore I will presently wait on you to your chamber, where, take counsel of your pillow; and, to-morrow resolve me. Here, take the lights; and pray follow them, sir: here you are like to lie; and now I have showed you your lodgings, I beseech you, command any thing you want, and so I wish you good rest.

VIAT. Good night, sir. †

* It should seem, by what Walton says, Chap. X. Part I., that he was a smoker and the reader sees, by the passage in the text, that Piscator, by whom we are to understand Cotton himself, is so curious as to have his tobacco from London. But our piscatory disciple may do as he pleases. Smoking, or, as the phrase was, taking tobacco, was, in Queen Elizabeth's and her successor's time, esteemed the greatest of all foppery. Ben Jonson, who mortally hated it, had numberless sarcasms against smoking and smokers; all of which are nothing, compared to those contained in that work of our King James the First, "A Counter-blast to Tobacco." Nor was the ordinary conversation of this monarch less fraught with reasons and invectives against the use of that weed, as will appear from the following saying of his, extracted from "A Collection of Witty Apophthegms," delivered by him and others, at several times, and on sundry occasions, published in 12mo. 1671. "That tobacco was the lively image and pattern of hell; for that it had, by allusion, in it all the parts and vices of the world whereby hell may be gained; to wit: First, It was a smoke; so are the vanities of this world. Secondly, It delighteth them who take it; so do the pleasures of the world delight the men of the world. Thirdly, It maketh men drunken and light in the head: so do the vanities of the world: men are drunken therewith. Fourthly, He that takes tobacco saith he cannot leave it, it doth bewitch him: even so do the pleasures of the world make men loath to leave them, they are for the most part so enchanted with them. And further, besides all this, it is like hell in the very substance of it, for it is a stinking loathsome thing; and so is hell. And further, his majesty professed that, were he to invite the devil to dinner, he should have three dishes; 1. A pig; 2. A pole of ling and mustard; and 3. A pipe of tobacco for digesture." In Herefordshire, to signify the last or concluding pipe that any one means to smoke at a sitting, they use the term a Kemble pipe, alluding to a man of the name of Kemble, who in the cruel persecution under the merciless bigot Queen Mary, being condemned for heresy, in his walk of some miles from the prison to the stake, amidst a crowd of weeping friends, with the tranquillity and fortitude of a primitive martyr, smoked a pipe of tobacco.-H.

The gentlemanly hospitality of Piscator, by whom we are here to understand Mr. Cotton himself, in his behaviour to a stranger, manifested in the foregoing part of the dialogue, and in this instance of courtesy, is well worth noting.-H.

254

CHAPTER III.

[Second Day.]

PISC. Good morrow, sir; what! up and drest so early? VIAT. Yes, sir, I have been drest this half hour; for I rested so well, and have so great a mind either to take, or to see a trout taken in your fine river, that I could no longer lie abed.

PISC. I am so glad to see you so brisk this morning, and so eager for sport; though I must tell you, this day proves so calm, and the sun rises so bright, as promises no great success to the angler; but, however, we'll try, and, one way or other, we shall sure do something. What will you have to your breakfast, or what will you drink this morning?

VIAT. For breakfast, I never eat any, and for drink am very indifferent; but if you please to call for a glass of ale, I'm for you; and let it be quickly, if you please, for I long to see the little fishing-house you spoke of, and to be at my lesson.

Pisc. Well, sir, you see the ale is come without calling; for though I do not know yours, my people know my diet, which is always one glass so soon as I am drest, and no more, till dinner: and so my servants have served you.

VIAT. My thanks! And now, if you please, let us look out this fine morning.

PISC. With all my heart. Boy, take the key of my fishinghouse, and carry down those two angle-rods in the hall window, thither, with my fish-pannier, pouch, and landingnet; and stay you there till we come. Come, sir, we'll walk after, where, by the way, I expect you should raise all the exceptions against our country you can.

VIAT. Nay, sir, do not think me so ill-natured nor so uncivil; I only made a little bold with it last night to divert you, and was only in jest.

PISC. You were then in as good earnest as I am now with you: but had you been really angry at it, I could not blame you: for, to say the truth, it is not very taking at first sight. But look you, sir, now you are abroad, does not the sun shine

as bright here as in Essex, Middlesex, or Kent, or any of your southern counties?

VIAT. It is a delicate morning, indeed; and I now think this a marvellous pretty place.

PISC. Whether you think so or no, you cannot oblige me more than to say so; and those of my friends who know my humour, and are so kind as to comply with it, usually flatter me that way. But look you, sir, now you are at the brink of the hill, how do you like my river, the vale it winds through like a snake, and the situation of my little fishinghouse?

VIAT. Trust me, 'tis all very fine, and the house seems at this distance a neat building.

PISC. Good enough for that purpose: and here is a bowling-green too, close by it; so, though I am myself no very good bowler, I am not totally devoted to my own pleasure, but that I have also some regard to other men's. And now, sir, you are come to the door, pray walk in, and there we will sit and talk as long as you please.