chap, v.] THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 105 



see I catch fish, yet you have not my fiddlestick : 

 that is, you yet have not skill to know how to 

 earn- your hand and line, nor how to guide it to a 

 right place : and this must be taught you ; — for you 

 are to remember I told you Angling is an art, — either 

 by practice, or a long observation, or both. But 

 take this for a rule, when you fish for a Trout 

 with a worm, let your line have so much, and not 

 more lead, than will fit the stream in which you 

 fish ; that is to say, more in a great troublesome 

 stream than in a smaller that is quieter : as near as 

 may be, so much as will sink the bait to the bot- 

 tom, and keep it still in motion, and not more. 



But now let's say grace and fall to breakfast. 

 What say you, Scholar, to the providence of an old 

 Angler ? Does not this meat taste well ? and was 

 not this place well chosen to eat it ? for this syca- 

 more-tree will shade us from the sun's heat. 



Ven. All excellent good ; and my stomach excel- 

 lent good too. And now I remember, and find that 

 true, which devout Lessius says, " that poor men, and 

 " those that fast often, have much more pleasure in 

 " eating than rich men and gluttons, that always 

 " feed before their stomachs are empty of their last 

 " meat, and call for more ; for by that means they 

 " rob themselves of that pleasure that hunger 

 " brings to poor men." And I do seriously approve 

 of that saying of your's, " that you had rather be 

 " a civil, well-governed, well-grounded, temperate, 

 " poor Angler, than a drunken lord : " but I hope 



