90 THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 



And yet I will exercise your promised patience by saying a 

 little of the caterpillar, or the palmer-fly or worm, that by them 

 you may guess, what a work it were in a discourse but to run 

 over those very many flies, worms, and little living creatures with 

 which the sun and summer adorn and beautify the river banks 

 and meadows, both for the recreation and contemplation of us 

 anglers ; pleasures which, I think, myself enjoy more than any 

 other man that is not of my profession. 



Pliny holds an opinion, that many have their birth or being 

 fi'om a dew, that in the spring falls upon the leaves of trees; and 

 that some kinds of them are from a dew left upon herbs or flow- 

 ers ; and others from a dew left upon coleworts or cabbages :* 

 all which kinds of dews being thickened and condensed, are by 

 the sun's generative heat most of them hatched, and in three 

 days made living creatures ; and these of several shapes and 

 colors ; some being hard and tough, some smooth and soft ; some 

 are horned in their head, some in their tail, some have none: 

 some have hair, some none : some have sixteen feet, some less, 

 and some have none ; but as our Topself hath with great dili- 

 gence observed, those which have none, move upon the earth, or 

 upon broad leaves, their motion being not unlike to the waves of 

 the sea. Some of them he also observes to be bred of the eggs 

 of other caterpillars, and that those in their time turn to be but- 

 terflies ; and again, that their eggs turn the following year to be 

 caterpillars. And some affirm, that every plant has his particular 

 fly or caterpillar, which it breeds and feeds. I have seen, and 

 may therefore al^rm it, a green caterpillar, or worm, as big as a 

 small peascod, which had fourteen legs, eight on the belly, four 

 under the neck, and two near the tail. It was found on a hedge 

 of privet, and was taken thence, and put into a large box, and a 

 little branch or two of privet put to it, on which I saw it feed as 

 sharply as a dog gnaws a bone : it lived thus five or six days, and 

 thrived, and changed the color two or three times ; but, by some 

 neglect in the keeper of it, it then died, and did not turn to a fly : 

 but if it had lived, it had doubtless turned to one of those flies of 



* The doctrine of spontaneous generation is now exploded. — Am. Ed. 

 t In his History of Serpents. — Walton's own Note. 



