24 Ikings of tbe 1Rofc, Iftifle, ant) (Bun 



lochs and mountains ! No : Franck's narrative might 

 have been easily improved upon, no doubt, but Izaak 

 Walton was not the man to do it. Doubtless Captain 

 Richard, as a bold soldier who had ridden in, may 

 be, a score of charges against the' Cavaliers, and seen 

 life in many stirring aspects, had a wholesome con- 

 tempt for the loyalist linen-draper, who had never 

 handled any weapon deadlier than his yard-wand 

 and angling-rod, and scorned his bottom-fishing in 

 the still waters of the Lea or that prosaic Cockney 

 conduit the New River. I can understand and half 

 sympathise with that contempt, and I think none the 

 worse of the Cromwellian trooper for expressing it. 

 He has his first dig at old Izaak in the following 

 passage, where Arnoldus unfolds to his friend The- 

 ophilus the programme of their tour : 



" We may also in our progress, as we travel the 

 country, take a survey of their towns, forts, and 

 fortresses, the like we may do of their cities, castles, 

 and citadels, with their rivers, rivulets, and solitary 

 loughs, which will furnish us with fish enough, provided 

 we can furnish ourselves with baits. But to furnish 

 every angler with a new bait was the studious invention 

 of Izaak Walton, author (as you may read) of the 

 Compleat Angler, who industriously takes care to 

 provide a good cook (supposing his wife had a finger 

 in the pye), which will necessarily be wanting in our 

 northern expedition where the fry are numerous (nay, 

 numberless almost) in some of those rapid and 

 trembling streams ; from whence the artificial fly (if 

 that exercise be well understood) will contribute as 



