where, by the way, I expect you should raise all the exceptions against our country you can.

Viator. 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.

Piscator. 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?

Viator. 'Tis a delicate morning, indeed, and I now think this a marvellous pretty place.

Piscator. 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 fishing house?

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

And here is a

Piscator. Good enough for that purpose. 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 'll sit, and talk as long as you please.

Viator. Stay, what's here over the door? Sacrum."*

"Piscatoribus

Why, then, I perceive I have some title here; for I am one of them, though one of the worst. And here, below it, is the cipher, too, you spoke of, and 'tis prettily contrived. Has my master Walton ever been here to see it, for it, seems new built? +

There is, under this motto, the cipher mentioned in pages 299 and 312. And some part of the fishing house has been described; but the pleasantness of the river, mountains, and meadows about it, cannot, unless Sir Philip Sidney, or Mr Cotton's father, were again alive to do it. I. W.

+ I have been favoured with an accurate description of this fishing house, by a person who, being in that country, with a view to oblige me, went to see it. The account he gave of it is, that it is of stone, and the room inside a cube of fifteen feet; that it is paved with black and white marble, and that in the middle is a square black marble table, supported by two stone feet. The room is wainscoted with curious mouldings that divide the panels up to the ceiling. In the larger panels are represented, in painting, some of the most pleasant of the adjacent scenes, with persons fishing; and in the smaller, the various sorts of tackle and implements used in angling. In the farther corner, on the left, is a fire-place, with a chimney; on the right, a large beaufet, with folding-doors, whereon are the portraits of Mr Cotton, with a boy-servant, and Walton, in the dress of the time. Underneath is a cupboard, on the door whereof the figures of a Trout and of a Grayling are well portrayed. The edifice is at this time

Piscator. Yes, he saw it cut in the stone before it was set up, but never in the posture it now stands; for the house was but building when he was last here, and not raised so high as the arch of the door. And I am afraid he will not see it yet; for he has lately writ me word, he doubts his coming down this summer, which, I do assure you, was the worst news he could possibly have sent me.

Viator. Men must sometimes mind their affairs, to make more room for their pleasures. And 'tis odds he is as much displeased with the business that keeps him from you, as you are that he comes not. But I am the most pleased with this little house, of any thing I ever saw it stands in a kind of peninsula, too, with a delicate clear river about it. I dare hardly go in, lest I should not like it so well within as without; but, by your leave, I'll try. Why, this is better and better! fine lights, finely wainscoted, and all exceeding neat, with a marble table and all in the middle!

Piscator. Enough, sir, enough; I have laid open to you the part where I can worst defend myself, and now you attack me there. Come, boy, set two chairs; and whilst I am taking a pipe of tobacco, which is always my breakfast, we will, if you please, talk of some other subject.

Viator. None fitter, then, sir, for the time and place, than those instructions you promised.

Piscator. I begin to doubt. by something I discover in you, whether I am able to instruct you or no; though, if you are really a stranger to our clear northern rivers, I still think I can : and, therefore, since it is yet too early in the morning at this time of the year, to-day being but the seventh of March, to cast a fly upon the water, you will direct me what kind of fishing for a Trout I shall read you a lecture on, I am willing and ready to obey you.

Viator. Why, sir, if you will so far oblige me, and that it may not be too troublesome to you, I would entreat you would run through the whole body of it; and I will not conceal from you, that I am so far in love with you, your courtesy, and pretty More-Land seat, as to resolve to stay with you long enough by intervals, for I will not oppress you, to hear all you can say upon that subject.

Piscator. You cannot oblige me more than by such a promise: and, therefore, without more ceremony, I will begin to tell you, that my father, Walton having read to you before, it

(1784) in but indifferent condition; the paintings, and even the wainscoting, in many places, being much decayed.-H.

Mr Bagster, who visited it in 1814, found it much dilapidated, the windows unglazed, and the wainscot and pavement gone, but the cipher still legible. J. R.

R

would look like a presumption in me (and, peradventure, would do so in any other man,) to pretend to give lessons for angling after him, who, I do really believe, understands as much of it at least as any man in England, did I not preacquaint you, that I am not tempted to it by any vain opinion of myself, that I am able to give you better directions; but having, from my childhood, pursued the recreation of angling in very clear rivers, truly, I think, by much (some of them, at least,) the clearest in this kingdom, and the manner of angling here with us, by reason of that exceeding clearness, being something different from the method commonly used in others, which, by being not near so bright, admit of stronger tackle, and allow a nearer approach to the stream, I may peradventure give you some instructions, that may be of use, even in your own rivers, and shall bring you acquainted with more flies, and shew you how to make them, and with what dubbing, too, than he has taken' notice of in his Complete Angler,

Viator. I beseech you, sir, do; and if you will lend me your steel, I will light a pipe the while, for that is commonly my breakfast in a morning, too.

CHAPTER IV,

OF ANGLING FOR TROUT OR GRAYLING.

Piscator, junior. WHY then, sir, to begin methodically, as a master in any art should do, (and I will not deny, but that I think myself a master in this,) I shall divide angling for Trout or Grayling into these three ways: at the top, at the bottom, and in the middle. Which three ways, though they are all of them, (as I shall hereafter endeavour to make it appear,) in some sort, common to both those kinds of fish; yet are they not so generally and absolutely so, but that they will necessarily require a distinction, which, in due place, I will also give you.

That which we call angling at the top, is with a fly; at the bottom, with a ground-bait; in the middle, with a Minnow or ground-bait.

Angling at the top is of two sorts: with a quick-fly, or with an artificial fly.

That we call angling at the bottom, is also of two sorts: by hand, or with a cork or float.

That we call angling in the middle, is also of two sorts: with a Minnow for a Trout, or with a ground-bait for a Grayling. Of all which several sorts of angling, I will, if you can have the patience to hear me, give you the best account I can.

. Viator. The trouble will be yours, and mine the pleasure and the obligation; I beseech you, therefore, to proceed. Piscator. Why, then, first for fily-fishing.

CHAPTER V.

OF FLY-FISHING.

Piscator, junior. FLY-FISHING, or fishing at the top, is, as I said before, of two sorts; with a natural and living fly, or with an artificial and made fly.

First, then, of the natural fly; of which we generally use but two sorts, and those but in the two months of May and June only; namely, the green-drake and the stone-fly : though I have made use of a third, that way, called the camlet-fily, with very good success, for Grayling, but never saw it angled with by any other, after this manner, my master only excepted, who died many years ago, and was one of the best anglers that ever I knew.

These are to be angled with with a short line, not much more than half the length of your rod, if the air be still; or with a longer very near or all out as long as your rod, if you have any wind to carry it from you. And this way of fishing we call daping, dabbing, or dibbing; * wherein you are always to have your line flying before you up or down the river, as the wind serves, and to angle as near as you can to the bank of the same side whereon you stand, though where you see a fish rise near you, you may guide your quick fly over him, whether in the middle, or on the contrary side; and if you are pretty well out of sight, either by kneeling, or the interposition of a bank or bush, you may almost be sure to raise, and take him too, if it be presently done; the fish will otherwise peradventure be removed to some other place, † if it be in the still deeps, where he is always in the motion, and roving up and down to look for prey, though, in a stream, you may always almost, especially if there be a good stone near, find him in the same place. Your line ought, in this case, to be three good hairs next the hook ; both by reason you are, in this kind of angling, to expect the

* See in chap. vii.. May, art. 1l, directions how to bait with the green drake-fly.

+ It may be considered almost the invariable habit of a fish, particularly Trout, to swim away from the spot where it has risen at a fly, so that the caution in the text is not far from correct.-J. R.

As the bird termed the fly-catcher has always a favourite post from which to spring upon flies on the wing, and hence it is called the post bird in Kent, so Trouts have usually a favourite stone to lie near in a river; and if you kill a Trout in such a haunt, his place will probably be soon supplied with another. - J. R.

biggest fish, and also that, wanting length to give him line after he is struck, you must be forced to tug for it: to which I will also add, that not an inch of your line being to be suffered to touch the water in dibbing, it may be allowed to be the stronger. I should now give you a description of those flies, their shape and colour; and then, give you an account of their breeding; and withal, shew you how to keep and use them: but shall defer that to their proper place and season.

Viator. In earnest, sir, you discourse very rationally of this affair, and I am glad to find myself mistaken in you; for, in plain truth, I did not expect so much from you.

Piscator. Nay, sir, I can tell you a great deal more than this: and will conceal nothing from you. But I must now come to the second way of angling at the top; which is with an artificial fly, which also I will shew you how to make before I have done; but, first, shall acquaint you, that, with this, you are to angle with a line longer by a yard and a half, or sometimes two yards, than your rod and with both this and the other in a still day, in the steams, in a breeze that curls the water, in the still deeps, where (excepting in May and June, that the best Trouts will lie in shallow streams to watch for prey, and even then too) you are like to hit the best fish.*

:

For the length of your rod, you are always to be governed by the breadth of the river you shall choose to angle at: and for a Trout river, one of five or six yards long is commonly enough; and longer (though never so neatly and artificially made) it ought not to be, if you intend to fish at ease: and if otherwise, where lies the sport?

Of these, the best that ever I saw are made in Yorkshire, which are all of one piece, that is to say, of several, six, eight, ten, or twelve pieces, so neatly pieced and tied together with fine thread below and silk above, as to make it taper like a switch, and to ply with a true bent to your hand, and these too are light, being made of fir wood for two or three lengths nearest to the hand, and of other wood nearer to the top, that a man might very easily manage the longest of them that ever I saw, with one hand. And these, when you have given over angling for a season, being taken to pieces, and laid up in some dry place, may afterward be set together again in their former postures, and will be as straight, sound, and good as the first hour they were made, and being laid in oil and colour, according to your master Walton's direction, will last many years.†

The length of your line, to a man that knows how to handle

For fishing with two or more flies, see note on next page.

The great objection to rods in many pieces is, that they are not sufficiently pliant; and no angler, who is as near his station as Mr Cotton was to the Dove, should think of such a pieced rod as he describes. — J. R.