4 THE SALT OF MY LIFE 



those who, from choice of necessity, angle only for 

 the " coarse " fish, seeing that Izaak Walton him- 

 self dubbed the carp " Queen of Rivers," and drew 

 his companion's attention to the choice sport 

 afforded by barbel. It perhaps needs no argu- 

 ment to shew that the habits of the tench and eel 

 may fairly be described as " coarse " by com- 

 parison with those of the Salmonidce, while as food, 

 at any rate in any hands but those of a German 

 cook skilled in the dressing of freshwater fish, 

 most of the " coarse " fish are contemptible. 



The precise extent to which considerations of the 

 cuisine should have weight with the sportsman 

 in choosing his quarry is always a debateable 

 question, and one that hardly gains much by 

 discussion. On the one hand, the old foraging 

 spirit, in which Esau went forth after venison, 

 burns in every sportsman, while the most plausible 

 platform justification of game-preserving is that it 

 cheapens game in the food-market. On the other 

 hand, we eat neither otters nor foxes, and if any 

 justification has to be given for the field-sports 

 of which these are the objects, it has to take the 

 shape of a rather questionable appeal to the 

 damage they do as vermin of the farm or trout- 

 stream, a feeble argument of which the critics of 

 sport are not backward to make capital. On the 

 other hand, we have the undeniable fact that, as 

 the little girl retorted when reproved for eating 



