Introduction xxxv 



from a kind of dew, and on the inscrutable caprice 

 of fish ; also, in England, on the miller, who giveth 

 or withholdeth at his pleasure the very water that 

 is our element. The inquiring rustic who shambles 

 up erect when we are lying low among the reeds, 

 even he disposes of our fortunes, with whom, as 

 with all men, we must be patient, dwelling ever 



" With close-lipped Patience for our only friend, 

 Sad Patience, too near neighbour of Despair ". 



O the tangles, more than Gordian, of gut on a 

 windy day ! O bitter east wind that bloweth down/ 

 stream! O the young ducks that, swimming be- 

 tween us and the trout, contend with him for the 

 blue duns in their season ! O the hay grass behind 

 us that entangles the hook ! O the rocky wall that 

 breaks it, the boughs that catch it ; the drought 

 that leaves the salmon-stream dry, the floods that 

 fill it with turbid, impossible waters ! Alas for the 

 knot that breaks, and for the iron that bends ; for 

 the lost landing-net, and the gillie with the gaff that 

 scrapes t'ne fish! Izaak believed that fish could ^ 

 hear ; if they can, their vocabulary must be full of 

 strange oaths, for all anglers are not patient men. 

 A malison on the trout that " bulge " and " tail," on 

 the salmon that "jiggers," or sulks, or lightly 

 gambols over and under the line. These things, 

 and many more, we anglers endure meekly, being 

 patient men, and a light world fleers at us for our 

 very virtue. 



Izaak, of course, justifies us by the example of 

 the primitive Christians, and, in the manner of the 

 age, drowns opposition in a flood of erudition, out 

 of place, but never pedantic ; futile, yet diverting ; 

 erroneous, but not dull. 



" God is said to have spoken to a fish, but never V. 

 to a beast." There is a modern Greek phrase, " By 



