Izaak Walton 31 



the most angling. Still less is it the one that has the most 

 fish in it. Not even the biggest fish, nor the greatest num- 

 ber of kinds, nor the greatest number of each kind, deter- 

 mine the finest fishing. The spirit of the angler, like all other 

 phases of the Kingdom of Heaven, is within us, depending 

 httle on outward conditions. But with all this, the Mecca 

 of the Angler is in Staffordshire, and must remain there for 

 all time, though the fish in the Stafford brooks be common, 

 home-hke creatures, in themselves scarcely worthy of a 

 place on the boy's string as he comes home from the mill- 

 pond. There are roaches and loaches in Staffordshire, and 

 chubs that bite at dough, gudgeons and barbels that leap to 

 the wriggling worm, with bleak and bream, and tench, and 

 perch, and the rest, who are not to be forgotten in our lit- 

 erature, even should our hooks fail to search for them. 

 But forever, so long as anglers read, and readers angle, there 

 shall be a brook dropping down lazily toward the Trent. 



It was not the beauty of the brooks alone which he dis- 

 closed on the banks of the Dove. There is " a bank whereon 

 the wild thyme grows " and on this bank grow, too, cow- 

 slips and daisies and dandelions, and here for all time in 

 memory, sits the genial Angler, and discourses as the birds 

 sing, of divers fish and divers flies, the love of the ancients, 

 the sweetness of humanity, and the way tO' dress fish — all 

 that belongs to the divine art of angling, as distinguished 

 from the vulgar trade of killing fish. It was here in Staf- 

 ford that men first saw the beauty of " England now that 

 April's there." Any other brooks, in any other shire, would 

 have served just as well, save, that but one brook, at one 

 time, could have its Izaak Walton. 



But the beauty he disclosed was not that of brooks and 

 woods. It was the delight of restfulness, the charm of the 

 open mind, the mind of him who is not in a hurry, who envies 

 not and hates not, who hath no fever in his blood, and asks 

 for nothing which life and sunshine may not freely give. 



With Walton, idle time is " not idly spent." Angling 



