68 American Fisheries Society 



debarred from doing so by its being invariably badly 

 cooked, or presented always in the same monotonous 

 dress." The everlasting boil, broil, fry or bake, of the 

 English and American cook, certainly makes one long 

 for the delicate and tasty sauces and methods of prepar- 

 ing fish of our French and Italian cousins. 



In 1758 there was published a book called "The 

 Anglers." It was published anonymously, and consisted 

 of eight dialogues in verse. This first edition is very 

 scarce and even as far back as 1820 was so little known 

 that the whole eight cantos were deliberately reprinted 

 by Thos. 0. Lathy without any acknowledgment what- 

 ever and called "The Angler." "This book is one of the 

 worst cases of literary plagiarism known. It was palmed 

 off on Gosden, the sporting bookseller, whose portrait 

 by A. Cooper, R. A., is prefixed. He paid £30 for the 

 copyright and also printed a single copy on vellum, at 

 an expense of £10 for the vellum alone, as he himself 

 states in a manuscript note to a sales catalog." Besides 

 this copy on vellum, twenty copies were printed in 

 quarto, in addition to the ordinary edition. The library 

 owns the single copy on vellum, most expensively bound 

 by Gosden himself and with his book plate and manu- 

 script notes ; also a copy of the quarto edition and of the 

 ordinary one ; also a copy of the original work of 1758. 

 The original edition of 1758 has by now been exclu- 

 sively attributed to Dr. Thomas Scott, a dissenting min- 

 ister of Ipswich. The preface, entitled "The Bookseller 

 to the Reader," contains a curious justification of angling, 

 perhaps worth repeating: "To a man of any compass 

 of thought and experience in the world it is well 

 known that angling is not a mere recreation, but a busi- 

 ness, a business which employeth most orders, profes- 

 sions and occupations among men. For instance, we 

 booksellers angle for authors, and authors angle for a 

 dinner or for fame. Again, doth not the lawyer angle 

 for clients, the doctor for a fee, the divine for prefer- 

 ment, the statesman for secrets, the courtier for a pen- 

 sion, and the needy for a place? Further, what is he 



