PREFACE. 



" I WILL ^vrite a sort of a Book on Fishing," 

 said I to my friend Mr. Lobworm ; when a fresh 

 breeze from the gentle south swept over the 

 meadows, " stealing and giving odours," and re- 

 minded me of the many calm and pleasant hours 

 I had spent by the margin of some crystal stream. 



" You really had better do no such thing," 

 replied Lob. — He was a man of few words. 



" Your very polite reason, if you please?" 



" Why the subject is utterly exhausted ; ninety- 

 nine books have been written upon it already, and 

 no man was ever the wiser for any one of them, 

 although many are clever and entertaining, and 

 moreover abound in excellent instructions." 



" Hold! you forget dear old Izaak," said I, 

 " whose dainty and primitive work, the emana- 

 tion of a beautiful mind, has made many a man 

 both wiser and better; for it is dictated through- 

 out by that wisdom of which it is written, ' Her 

 ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths 

 are peace.' " 



