THE COMPLETE ANGLER 103 



Pise. Look you, scholar, you see I have hold of a 

 good fish : I now see it is a trout, I pray put that net 

 under him, and touch not my line, for if you do, then we 

 break all.* Well done, scholar, I thank you. 



Now for another. Trust me, I have another bite : come, 

 scholar, come lay down your rod, and help me to land this 

 as you did the other. So now we shall be sure to have a 

 good dish for supper. 



VEN. I am glad of that : but I have no fortune : 

 sure, master, yours is a better rod and better tackling. 



Pise. Nay, then, take mine ; and I will fish with yours. 

 Look you, scholar, I have another. Come, do as you did 

 before. And now I have a bite at another. Oh me ! 

 he has broke all : there's half a line and a good hook 

 lost. 



VEN. Ay, and a good trout too. 



Pise. Nay, the trout is not lost ; for pray take notice, 

 no man can lose what he never had. 



VEN. Master, I can neither catch with the first nor 

 second angle : I have no fortune. 



Pise. Look you, scholar, I have yet another. And 

 now, having caught three [two] brace of trouts, I will tell 

 you a short tale as we walk towards our breakfast. A 

 scholar, a preacher* I should say, that was to preach to 

 procure approbation of a parish that he might be their 

 lecturer, had got from his fellow pupil the copy of a sermon 

 that was first preached with great commendation by him 

 that composed it : and though the borrower of it preached 

 it, word for word, as it was at first, yet it was utterly 

 disliked as it was preached by the second to his congrega- 

 tion : which the sermon-borrower complained of to the 

 lender of it : and thus was answered : " I lent you, 

 indeed, my fiddle, but not my fiddle-stick ; for you are 



* Nothing can be sounder than this advice. In playing a fish, 

 the line must never be seized by the hand, but it must be shortened 

 more or less according to circumstances, by winding it up by means 

 of the winch or reel. E. 



