THE COMPLETE ANGLER 215 



take a handful or two of the best and biggest wheat you 

 can get, boil it in a little milk, like as frumity is boiled ; 

 boil it so till it be soft, and then fry it very leisurely 

 with honey, and a little beaten saffron dissolved in milk ; 

 and you will find this a choice bait, and good, I think, 

 for any fish, especially for roach, dace, chub, or grayling : 

 I know not but that it may be as good for a river carp, 

 and especially if the ground be a little baited with it. 



And you may also note, that the spawn of most fish 

 is a very tempting bait, being a little hardened on a 

 warm tile, and cut into fit pieces. Nay, mulberries, 

 and those blackberries which grow upon briars, be good 

 baits for chubs or carps : with these many have been 

 taken in ponds, and in some rivers where such trees have 

 grown near the water, and the fruits customarily dropped 

 in it. And there be a hundred other baits, more than 

 can be well named, which, by constant baiting the 

 water, will become a tempting bait for any fish in it. 



You are also to know, that there be divers kinds of 

 cadis, or case worms, that are to be found in this nation, 

 in several distinct counties, and in several little brooks 

 that relate to bigger rivers ; as namely, one cadis called 

 a piper, whose husk or case is a piece of reed about an 

 inch long, or longer, and as big about as the compass 

 of a two-pence. These worms being kept three or four 

 days in a woollen bag, with sand at the bottom of it, 

 and the bag wet once a day, will in three or four days turn 

 to be yellow ; and these be a choice bait for the chub 

 or chavender, or indeed for any great fish, for it is a 

 large bait. 



There is also a lesser cadis-worm, called a cock-spur, 

 being in fashion like the spur of a cock, sharp at one 

 end ; and the case or house, in which this dwells, is made 

 of small husks and gravel and slime, most curiously made 

 of these, even so as to be wondered at, but not to be 

 made by man, no more than a king-fisher's nest can, 



