22 THB TROUT 



which has been thus rendered into English : 



" Angler, would'st thou be guiltless ? then forbear, 

 For these are sacred fishes that swim here ; 

 Who know their sovereign, and will lick his hand, 

 Than which none's greater in the world's command ; 

 Nay more, they've names, and when they called are, 

 Do to their several owners' call repair."* 



Carew, also, in his survey of Cornwall, states that he brought 

 his grey mullet together (which he kept enclosed in a pond) to be 

 fed by making a noise with two sticks ; and it is a well-known fact 

 that Sir Joseph Banks used to collect his fish together by ringing 

 a bell, whilst it is the constant practice amongst the Chinese to call 

 their gold and silver fish together, of which they breed great quan- 

 tities, by means of a whistle ; and I well remember some minnows 

 that in my boyish days I kept in a tub of water, would show 

 evident symptoms of alarm and endeavour to find a place of con- 

 cealment from any noise being made near them, though they 

 could not possibly see the cause of it. 



With respect to their sense of smelling, it seems that most fishes 

 possess this sense very acutely : a pike, as Mr. Yarrell observes, 

 will turn back from a stale bait when at some distance from his 

 nose ; a fact I have often, to my no small vexation, had frequently 

 opportunities of corroborating, and I am inclined to think that 

 some fishes are almost as much guided by scent as by sight in pur- 

 suit of their food. I have often dropped in a baited hook behind 

 an eel, and where it was impossible he could see it, which he has 

 almost instantly turned round and laid hold of. I also consider the 

 sense of taste is much more acute than is generally supposed, par- 

 ticularly in the trout, which is remarkably shown in worm fishing, 

 when, if the baits are not in good order, though they may be frequent- 

 ly seized, yet the trout will refuse to swallow them, and yet they will 

 bolt a well-conditioned worm most ravenously. But the sense of touch 

 in fish is not very acute, owing, in a great measure to the thick 

 external covering of scales, with which the greater part of them are 

 coated, and this accounts for their allowing themselves to be taken 



* Walton's Angler, page 129, 



