Introduction. 9 



teaching the choycest tooles, baites and seasons for the taking of any fish in 

 pond or river, praktised and opened in three bookes, by John Dennys, 

 Esquire, vjd." 



Sir Harris Nicolas, who, in his edition of Walton's Angler (1836) begins 

 by asserting (very gratuitously) that the poem, "though entered in the name of 

 Dennys, is by John Uavors," adds a subsequent note of recantation : " There 

 are strong reasons," he says, "for believing that the 'Secrets of Angling,' was 

 not written by John Davors, but by John Dennys Esq., who was lord of the 

 Manor of Oldbury-sur-Montem, in the County of Gloucester, between 1572 and 

 1608. He was a younger son of Sir Walter Dennys, of Pucklechurch, in that 

 county, by Agnes, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Robert Davers or Danvers. 

 It has been observed by Mr. James Williamson, that the author of the ' Secrets ' 

 speaks of the River Boyd as ' washing the clirTs of Deington and Week.' 

 There is, in fact, a beautiful rivulet, called Boyd, which is formed by four 

 distinct streams, rising in the parishes of Codrington, Pucklechurch, Dyrham 

 and Toghill, in the southern part of the County of Gloucester, between Bath 

 and Bristol, which join in Wyke or Week Street, in the parish of Alston and 

 Wyke, near a bridge of three large arches, and thence, by the name of Boyd, 

 descends to Avon, at Kynsham Bridge, and which river passes through the 

 village of Pucklechurch and thence flows on to Bitton. At Alston and Wyke 

 there are many high cliffs or rocks, and in the north Aisle of the Ancient 

 Church of Pucklechurch is the burial place of the family of Dennys. John 

 Dennys was resident in that neighbourhood in the year 1572, and so continued 

 till 1608 during which interval he was lord of the manor of Oldbury-sur-montem, 

 and of other places in the county of Gloucester." 



There seems great and serious cause to doubt the accuracy of Sir Harris 

 Nicolas's hypothesis, as given in the above extract. 



I was favoured, some time since, by the Rev. H. N. Ellacombe, of Bitton, 

 with a portion of the Dennys pedigree, showing six descents from the Sir 

 Walter in question, and Mr. Ellacombe infers therefrom, and with great show 

 of reason, that the real author of the poem was more probably Sir Walter's 

 great-grandson, the John Dennys who was buried at Pucklechurch in 1609, 

 four years, that is to say, previous to the publication of the volume. 



