THE COMPLETE ANGLER. SM7 



CHAPTER XI. 



Obserations of the TENCH, and Advice how to 

 Angle for him. 



PlSCATOR. 



THE Tench, the physician of fishes, is observed to 

 love ponds better than rivers, and to love pits better than 

 either ; yet Camden observes, there is a river in Dorset- 

 shire that abounds with Tenches ; but doubtless they 

 retire to the most deep and quiet places in it. 



This fish hath very large fins ; very small and smooth 

 scales ; a red circle about his eyes, which are big and 

 of a gold colour : and from either angle of his mouth, 

 there hangs down a little barb. In every Tench's head 

 there are two little stones, which foreign physicians 

 make great use of: but he is not commended for whole- 

 some meat, though there be very much use made of 

 them [Tench] for outward applications. Rondeletius 

 says, That at his being at Rome, he saw a great cure 

 done by applying a Tench to the feet of a very sick 

 man. .This, he says, was done after an unusual manner 

 by certain Jews. And it is observed, that many of those 

 people have many secrets yet unknown to Christians : 

 secrets that have never yet been written, but have been 

 since the days of their Solomon, who knew the na- 

 ture of all things, even from the cedar to the shrub 

 delivered by tradition, from the father to the son, and 

 so from generation to generation without writing ; or, 

 unless it were casually, without the least communicat- 

 ing them to any other nation or tribe, for to do that, 

 they account a profanation. And, yet, it is thought 

 that they, or some spirit worse than they, first told us, 

 That lice, swallowed alive, were a certain cure for the 

 yellow-jaundice. This, and many other medicines, 



