THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 199 



water remaining, nor one of these fish to be found, 

 though they were diligently searched for ; and yet 

 the next spring when the ice was thawed and the 

 weather warm, and fresh water got into the pond, 

 he affirms they all appeared again. This Gesner 

 affirms, and I quote my author because it seems 

 almost as incredible as the resurrection to an 

 atheist. But it may win something in point of 

 believing it to him that considers the breeding or 

 renovation of the silkworm and of many insects. 

 And that is considerable which Sir Francis Bacon 

 observes in his " History of Life and Death," 

 folio* 20, that there be some herbs that die and 

 spring every year, and some endure longer. 



But though some do not, yet the French esteem 

 this fish highly, and to that end have this proverb : 

 " He that hath breams in his pond is able to bid 

 his friend welcome." And it is noted that the 

 best part of a bream is his belly and head. 



Some say that breams and roaches will mix 

 their eggs and melt together, and so there is in 

 many places a bastard breed of breams that 

 never come to be either large or good, but very 

 numerous. 



The baits good to catch this bream are many. 

 First, paste made of brown bread and honey, 

 gentles, or the brood of wasps that be young, and 

 then not unlike gentles, and should be hardened 

 in an oven, or dried on a tile before the fire to 

 make them tough ; or there is at the root of 

 docks or flags or rushes, in watery places, a worm 



