fibst day.] SENSIBILITY OF FISH. 11 



them out of the water by main force with the net ; 

 and in general when taken by the common fisherman, 

 fish are permitted to die slowly, and to suffer in the 

 air, from the want of their natural element; whereas, 

 svery good angler, as soon as his fish is landed, either 

 destroys his life immediately, if he is wanted for food, 

 3r returns him into the water. 



PHYS. — But do you think nothing of the torture of 

 the hook, and the fear of capture, and the misery of 

 struggling against the powerful rod ? 



HAL. — I have already admitted the danger of 

 analysing, too closely, the moral character of any of 

 our field-sports ; yet I think it cannot be doubted 

 that the nervous system of fish, and cold-blooded 

 animals in general, is less sensitive than that of warm- 

 blooded animals. The hook usually is fixed in the 

 cartilaginous part of the mouth, where there are no 

 nerves ; and a proof that the sufferings of a hooked 

 fish cannot be great is found in the circumstance, that 

 though a trout has been hooked and played for some 

 minutes, he will often, after his escape with the arti- 

 ficial fly in his mouth, take the natural fly, and feed 

 as if nothing had happened ; having apparently learnt 

 only from the experiment, that the artificial fly is not 

 proper food. And I have caught pikes with four or 

 five hooks in their mouths, and tackle which they had 

 broken only a few minutes before; and the hooks 



