Izaak Walton 



mere accident, which, according to Major, 

 happened thus : 



" Walton became an author by chance. 

 Sir Henry Wotton had undertaken to write 

 the life of Dr. Donne, and had requested 

 Walton to assist him in collecting mate- 

 rials for that purpose ; but Sir Henry dying 

 before it was completed, Walton under- 

 took it himself." 



Indeed, it appears, according to the 

 authority of Izaak Walton himself, that 

 Wotton also may have been connected 

 with the suggestion of The Complete Angler. 

 " Sir Henry Wotton, a dear lover of this 

 Art, has told me that his intentions were 

 to write a Discourse of the Art, and in 

 praise of angling. And doubtless he had 

 done so, if death had not prevented him ; 

 the remembrance of which hath often 

 made me sorry : for if he had lived to do 

 it, then the unlearned Angler had seen 

 some better Treatise of his Art, a Trea- 

 tise that might have proved worthy his 

 perusal, which, though some have under- 

 taken, I could never yet see in English." 

 Such is the modest confession of our 

 author as contained in his dedication of 

 The Complete Angler, "To the Right 

 Worshipful John Offley, Esq., of Madely 



301 



