242 THE COMPLETE ANGLER 



Bless'd silent groves, O may you be, 

 For ever, mirth's best nursery ! 



May pure contents 



For ever pitch their tents 

 Upon these downs, these meads, these rocks, these 



mountains, 

 And peace still slumber by these purling fountains ; 



Which we may every year 



Meet, when we come a-fishing here ! 



Pise. Trust me, scholar, I thank you heartily for 

 these verses : they be choicely good, and doubtless made 

 by a lover of angling. Come, now, drink a glass with me, 

 and I will requite you with another very good copy : it 

 is a farewell to the vanities of the world, and some say 

 written by Sir Harry Wotton, who I told you was an 

 excellent angler. But let them be writ by whom they 

 will, he that writ them had a brave soul, and must needs 

 be possessed with happy thoughts at the time of their 

 composure. 



Farewell, ye gilded follies, pleasing troubles ! 

 Farewell, ye honour'd rags, ye glorious bubbles 1 

 Fame's but a hollow echo gold, pure clay 

 Honour, the darling but of one short day 

 Beauty, th' eye's idol, but a damask'd skin 

 State, but a golden prison, to live in, 

 And torture free-born minds embroider'd trains, 

 Merely but pageants for proud swelling veins 

 And blood allied to greatness is alone 

 Inherited, not purchased, nor our own. 



Fame, honour, beauty, state, train, blood, and birth, 

 Are but the fading blossoms of the earth. 



I would be great, but that the sun doth still 

 Level his lays against the rising hill 

 I would be high, but see the proudest oak 

 Most subject to the rending thunder-stroke 

 I would be rich, but see men (too unkind) 

 Dig in the bowels of the richest mind 

 I would be wise, but that I often see 

 The fox suspected, whilst the ass goes free 



