48 Ifcfnss of tbe 1Rofc t IRffle, anfc (Bun 



it left any mark on his career. In 1675 he married 

 again. His second wife was Mary, daughter of Sir 

 William Russell, Bart, of Strensham, Worcestershire, 

 and widow of Wingfield, 5th Baron Cromwell. She 

 had a jointure of 1,500 a year, which enabled her 

 husband to keep some kind of state at his paternal 

 mansion, Beresford Hall, but did not help him to 

 liquidate his debts. Indeed, he drifted further and 

 further into insolvency, and was as pestered with 

 duns as Richard Brinsley Sheridan. 



It was in 1675 that he renewed his acquaintance 

 with Walton, under the circumstances described in 

 the following letter : 



" TO MY MOST WORTHY FATHER AND FRIEND, 

 MR. IZAAK WALTON THE ELDER. 



SIR, Being you were pleased, some years past, 

 to grant me your free leave to do what I have here 

 attempted : and observing you never retract any promise 

 when made in favour of your meanest friends: I 

 accordingly expect to see these following particular 

 directions for the taking of a trout, to wait upon 

 your better and more general rules for all sorts of 

 angling. And though mine be neither so perfect, so 

 well digested, nor indeed so handsomely couch'd as 

 they might have been, in so long a time as since 

 your leave was granted, yet I dare affirm them to 

 be generally true : and they had appeared, too, in 

 something a neater dress, but that I was surprised 

 with the sudden news of a sudden new edition of 



