CHAPTER II. 



The Celebrated Treatyse of Fysshynge wyth an 

 Angle Attributed to Dame Juliana Berners, 

 1496 Bibliographical Account of It Its 

 Practical Value from an Angler's Point of 

 View Considered as an Angling Idyl. 



INASMUCH as nothing of the kind 

 preceded it, and all later works 

 are in some measure indebted to 

 it, either for form or matter, The 

 Treatyse of Fysshynge wyth an Angle, at- 

 tributed to Dame Juliana Berners, must 

 be accounted one of the most interesting, 

 if not the most interesting, of books on 

 angling in the English language. 



It was in 1486, a few months after the 

 last battle of the Wars of the Roses, when 

 Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, was pro- 

 claimed King of England as Henry VII. 

 on Bosworth field, that "The School- 

 master of St. Albans " printed The Book of 

 St. Albans, the first sporting work in the 

 English language. It is divided into three 

 parts : the first part treats of Hawking, 

 10 



