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Ixxli BIBLIOGRAPHICAL PREFACE. 



nin«-ity-five, having neither his eye-sight, his hearing, nor 

 hifts memory impaired. Walton himself lived to upwards 

 "of ninety ; Henry ^Mackenzie (the Man of Feeling) died 

 in January, 1831, aged eighty-six ; and the Rev. H. C, 

 who resided a short distance from this, and had been an 

 angler from his youth, continued to fish until upwards of 

 eighty ; and I could mention several others, who are 

 upwards of seventy, and still continue in their * frosty but 

 kindly' age to fish by the side of those streams — associated 

 in their minds with a hundred pleasing recollections — 

 where first the love of angling and of Nature w^as im- 

 pressed upon their youthful hearts, which time has deepen- 

 ed and confirmed, and which death only can efface. It 

 must, however, be observed that the oldest anglers have 

 been remarkable for their temperance, and for the quiet, 

 even tenor of their lives." An observation of anglers in 

 this country confirms these views. 



The life of Walton (who was ready at eighty-six to 

 make a journey of a hundred miles to angle with Cotton 

 in the " fair Dove," and doubtless fished for years after- 

 wards) is an admirable refutation of those whoiook upon 

 angling as the idle sin of an idle man. Who, with his 

 opportunities, has done more for religion and literature, or 

 who has left a dearer and better name for every meek 

 grace of Christianity behind him ? My wish for my readers 

 is, that they may be as good men and as good anglers ; 

 then, I am sure, their time by the silver streams will 

 not be misspent. With what modest faith and meek 

 repentance he looked forward to his translation from the 

 present world, is seen in his touching conclusion of his 

 Life of Sanderson : " Thus this pattern of meekness and 

 primitive innocence changed this for a better life. 'Tis 

 now too late to wish that my life may be like his ; for I 

 am now in the eighty-fifth year of my age (and God 

 knows it hath not) ; but I humbly beseech Almighty God 

 that my death may ; and do as earnestly beg of every 



