116 ESSAYS BIOGRAPHICAL AND CHEMICAL 



It is too often supposed that, like the poet, discoverers 

 are ' born, not made ' ; but I think I shall be able to show 

 that many people, though not all, have in them the power 

 of making discoveries ; and if this short article can give 

 to any one the hope of making discoveries, and prompt 

 him to try, it will have more than achieved its object. 



Like every other endeavour, the beginning is in small 

 things. Any one who tries to look into anything with 

 sufficient care will find something new. A drop of water ; 

 a grain of sand ; an insect ; a blade of grass ; we know in- 

 deed little about them when all is told. First, of course, 

 we must learn what others have done ; and for that pur- 

 pose we go to school and to college, and read books and 

 hear lectures. Before beginning, we should at least have 

 an idea of what has been achieved by our predecessors. 

 After that there is nothing for it but to try. 



But there are two ways of trying : and Avhat I wish to 

 convey is best told in an allegory. 



There are two kinds of fishers : those who fish for 

 sprats and those who angle for salmon. I do not say 

 there are not others ; but these two kinds are at the 

 extremes of the fishing world. The fishers for sprats are 

 sure of a large catch, or at least of catching something ; 

 but the fish are small, not particularly attractive as food, 

 and of no great value ; they are, however, numerous and 

 easily caught. But the salmon fisher hunts a very dif- 

 ferent prey ; if there is any special quality about a salmon, 

 it is his power of motion and his fickleness of taste ; so 

 that the angler, when he casts his line, is by no means 

 sure that a fish is within reach of his cast, nor, if he is, 

 whether he will rise to the fly. If fate is propitious, how- 

 ever, his prize is a great one; his pleasure consists not 

 merely in catching the fish, but in struggling with him, 

 possibly for an hour or more ; wading after him in alter- 

 nate hope and fear hope that his line may stand the 



