FISHING IN GENERAL. 84 i 



which it is characterized at the present day ; and what was 

 reckoned in more early periods a toilsome employment, has as- 

 sumed the character of a recreation to the sedentary, and an 

 amusement to opulent leisure. To these two classes we must 

 remark, that the pleasure of angling consists not so much in 

 the number of fish we catch, as in the exercise of our art, the 

 gratification of our hopes, and the reward of our skill and 

 ingenuity. Were it possible for an angler to be sure of 

 every cast of his fly, so that for six hours together his hook 

 should never be drawn from the water without a fish at it, 

 angling would be no more a recreation than the hewing of a 

 stone, or the pumping of water. 



>Some vain and foolish individuals, wishing to acquire and 

 preserve the character of expert anglers, by boasting of the 

 number of fish which they kill, are guilty of that mean practice 

 of buying fish of such sportsmen as have had better success 

 than themselves, thereby giving occasion for that bitter sar- 

 casm — the more bitter for being true — " They were caught 

 with a silver hook." 



Fishing may be divided into two distinct classes, namely, 

 sea^ and river-fishing. Each of these again is followed in 

 two distinct manners, namely, by the net, and by the line. 

 The former of these modes is never pursued as an amusing 

 pastime by the true sportsman ; and whether it is in the 

 ocean or in fresh waters that he seeks that recreation, it is 

 always with the line, either with bait or with the fly, natural 

 or artificial. 



Angling, or capturing fish by means of a rod, line, and 

 hook, is said to have been practised 1498 years before the 

 Christian sera. We are informed by the book of Job that 

 he was an angler ; as was also the prophet Amos. It is also 

 said in Isaiah, chap. xix. ver. 8 : — " The fishers shall mourn, 

 and all they that cast angle upon the brooks shall lament, 

 ^ 5 p 



