X Preface. 



1590. Taverner's Certaine Experiments concerning Fifh 

 and Fruit e followed in 1600. Then came in 1613 the Secrets 

 of Angling of the celebrated angling poet, J. D. [John 

 Dennys], whofe verfes have perhaps never yet been furpaffed ; 

 and finally, in 1651, appeared Barker's Art of Angling. 

 With this fiflierman and " ambaffador's cook," as he calls 

 himfelf, Walton muft often have converfed. 



It is a further teftimony to the attractions which angling 

 has always poffeffed for contemplative natures that the art 

 appears here fyftematifed, fo to fpeak, as early as the middle 

 of the fifteenth century in England, where it has been prac- 

 tifed ever fince with more enthufiafm and fkill than in other 

 countries. There is a fad gap in angling literature from the 

 days of Aufonius, at the commencement of the fourth century, 

 to thofe of Dame Juliana Berners. Fly-fifhing, indeed, is not 

 named between the time of yElian and that of the Treatyfe. 

 It is clearly defcribed by the former writer, who alone among 

 the ancients mentions it, but in the prefent book it is fpoken 

 of under the term "angling with a dubbe," as if it were well- 

 known and pradifed. Not only fo, but it is clear that the 

 writer had books of angling lore before her, perhaps 

 monkifh manufcripts, as Hawkins fuggefts, which would be 

 of ineftimable intereft could they now be recovered. Thus in 

 fpeaking of the carp, the reader will find (he writes — "as touch- 

 ynge his baytes I haue but lytyll knowlege of it. And me 

 were loth to wryte more than I knowe & haue prouyd. But 

 well I wote that the redde worme & the menow ben good 

 baytys for hym at all tymes as I haue herde faye of perfones 

 credyble & alfo founde wryten in bokes of credence." No 

 better rules can be given for fly-fifhing at prefent than the 

 two which fhe prefcribes for angling — " for the fyrfte and 

 pryncypall poynt in anglynge : kepe y' euer fro the water fro 



