Ven. I thank you, good master, for this piece of merriment, and this song, which was well humoured by the maker, and well remembered by you. Pisc. But, I pray, forget not the catch which you promised to make against night; for our countryman, honest Coridon, will expect your catch, and my song, which I must be forced to patch up, for it is so long since I learnt it, that I have forgot a part of it. But, come, now it hath done raining, let's stretch our legs a little in a gentle walk to the river, and try what interest our angles will pay us for lending them so long to be used by the Trouts; lent them indeed, like usurers, for our profit and their destruction. Ven. Oh me! look you, master, a fish! a fish! Oh, alas, master, I have lost her! Pisc. I marry, Sir, that was a good fish indeed: if I had had the luck to have taken up that rod, then 'tis twenty to one he should not have broke my line by running to the rod's end, as you suffered him. I would have held him within the bent of my rod, (unless he had been fellow to the great Trout that is near an ell long, which was of such a length and depth, that he had his picture drawn, and now is to be seen at mine host Rickabie's, at the George in Ware,) and it may be, by giving that very great Trout the rod, that is, by casting it to him into the water, I might have caught him at the long run; for so I use always to do when I meet with an overgrown fish; and you will learn to do so too, hereafter; for I tell you, scholar, fishing is an art, or, at least, it is an art to catch fish. Ven. But, master, I have heard that the great Trout you speak of is a Salmon. Pisc. Trust me, scholar, I know not what to say to it. There are many country people that believe hares change sexes every year: and there be very many learned men think so too, for in their dissecting them they find many reasons to incline them to that belief. And to make the wonder seem yet less, that hares change sexes, note that Dr. Mer. Casaubon affirms, in his book Of credible and incredible things, that Gasper Peucerus, a learned physician,' tells us of a people that once a year turn wolves, partly in shape, and partly in conditions. And so, whether this were a Salmon when he came into fresh water, and his not returning into the sea hath altered him to another colour or kind, I am not able to say; but I am certain he hath all the signs of being a Trout, both for his shape, colour, and spots: and yet many think he is not. Ven. But, master, will this Trout which I had hold of die? for it is like he hath the hook in his belly. Pisc. I will tell you, scholar, that unless the hook be fast in his very gorge, 'tis more than probable he will live, and a little time, with the help of the water, will rust the hook, and it will in time wear away, as the gravel doth in the horse-hoof, which only leaves a false quarter. And now, scholar, let's go to my rod. Look you scholar, I have a fish too, but it proves a logger-headed Chub; and this is not much amiss, for this will pleasure some poor body, as we go to our lodging to meet our brother Peter and honest Coridon. Come, now bait your hook again, and lay it into the water, for it rains again; and we will even retire to the sycamore-tree, and there I will give you more directions concerning fishing, for I would fain make you an artist. Ven. Yes, good master, I pray let it be so. 4 Pisc. Well, scholar, now we are sate down and are at ease, I shall tell you a little more of Trout-fishing, before I speak of the Salmon (which I purpose shall be next), and then of the Pike or Luce. (1) And mathematician, born at Lusatia, in 1525; he married the daughter of Melancthon, wrote many books on various subjects, and died 1602, aged 78. You are to know, there is night as well as day-fishing for a Trout; and that, in the night, the best Trouts come out of their holes. And the manner of taking them, is on the top of the water with a great lob or garden-worm, or rather two, which you are to fish with in a place where the waters run somewhat quietly, for in a stream the bait will not be so well discerned. I say, in a quiet or dead place, near to some swift, there draw your bait over the top of the water, to and fro, and if there be a good Trout in the hole, he will take it, especially if the night be dark, for then he is bold, and lies near the top of the water, watching the motion of any frog, or water-rat, or mouse, that swims betwixt him and the sky; these he hunts after, if he sees the water but wrinkle or move in one of these dead holes, where these great old Trouts usually lie, near to their holds: for you are to note, that the great old Trout is both subtle and fearful, and lies close all day, and does not usually stir out of his hold, but lies in it as close in the day as the timorous hare does in her form; for the chief feeding of either is seldom in the day, but usually in the night, and then the great Trout feeds very boldly. And you must fish for him with a strong line, and not a little hook; and let him have time to gorge your hook, for he does not usually forsake it, as he oft will in the dayfishing. And if the night be not dark, then fish so with an artificial fly of a light colour, and at the snap: nay, he will sometimes rise at a dead mouse, or a piece of cloth, or any thing that seems to swim across the water, or to be in motion. This is a choice way, but I have not oft used it, because it is void of the pleasures that such days as these, that we two now enjoy, afford an angler. And you are to know, that in Hampshire, which I think exceeds all England for swift, shallow, clear, pleasant brooks, and store of Trouts, they use to catch Trouts in the night, by the light of a torch or straw, which, when they have discovered, they strike with a Trout-spear, or other ways. This kind of way they catch very many: but I would not believe it till I was an eye-witness of it, nor do I like it now I have seen it. Ven. But, master, do not Trouts see us in the night? Pisc. Yes, and hear, and smell too, both then and in the day-time: for Gesner observes, the Otter smells a fish forty furlongs off him in the water: and that it may be true, seems to be affirmed by Sir Francis Bacon, in the eighth century of his Natural History, who there proves that waters may be the medium of sounds, by demonstrating it thus; "That if you knock two stones together very deep under the water, those that stand on a bank near to that place may hear the noise without any diminution of it by the water." He also offers the like experiment concerning the letting an anchor fall, by a very long cable or rope, on a rock, or the sand, within the sea. And this being so well observed and demonstrated as it is by that learned man, has made me to believe that Eels unbed themselves and stir at the noise of thunder, and not only, as some think, by the motion or stirring of the earth which is occasioned by that thunder. And this reason of Sir Francis Bacon, (Exper. 792,) has made me crave pardon of one that I laughed at for affirming that he knew Carps come to a certain place, in a pond, to be fed at the ringing of a bell or the beating of a drum. And, however, it shall be a rule for me to make as little noise as I can when I am fishing until Sir Francis Bacon be confuted, which I shall give any man leave to do.1 (1) That fish hear, is confirmed by the authority of late writers: Swammerdam asserts it, and adds, that "they have a wonderful labyrinth of the ear for that purpose." See Swammerdam, Of Insects, edit. London, 1758, p. 50. A clergyman, a friend of mine, assures me, that at the abbey of St. Bernard, near 'Antwerp, he saw Carp come at the whistling of the feeder. And lest you may think him singular in this opinion, I will tell you, this seems to be believed by our learned Doctor Hakewill, who in his Apology of God's power and providence,' f. 360, quotes Pliny to report that one of the emperors had particular fish-ponds, and, in them, several fish that appeared and came when they were called by their particular names.2 And St. James tells us, chap. 3. 7. that all things in the sea have been tamed by mankind. And Pliny tells us, lib. ix. 35. that Antonia, the wife of Drusus, had a Lamprey at whose gills she hung jewels or ear-rings; and that others have been so tenderhearted as to shed tears at the death of fishes which they have kept and loved. And these observations, which will to most hearers seem wonderful, seem to have a fur ther confirmation from Martial3 lib. iv. Epigr. 30. who writes thus: Piscutor, fuge; ne nocens, &c. Angler! would'st thou be guiltless? then forbear; Who know their sovereign, and will lick his hand; Nay more, they've names, and, when they called are, All the furthur use that I shall make of this shall be, to (1) This book, which was published in folio, 1635, and is full of excellent learning and good sense, contains an examination and censure of that common error which philosophers have fallen into, "that there is in nature a perpetual and universal decay;" the contrary whereof, after an extensive view of the history of the physical and moral world, and a judicious and impartial comparison of former ages with that wherein the author lived, is with great force of argument demonstrated. The reader may, in this book, meet with a relation of that instance of Lord Cromwell's gratitude to Sig. Frescobaldi, a Florentine. merchant, which is given, in a dramatic form, in the History of Thomas Lord Cromwell, published as Shakspeare's by some of the earlier editors of his works. (2) Mons. Berneier, in his History of Indostan, reports the like of the Great Mogul. (3) The verses cited are as follow: "Piscator, fuge; ne nocens recedas, Sacris piscibus hæ natantur undæ ; Qui nôrunt dominum, manumque lambunt Illam, quâ nihil est, in orbe, majus : |