222 THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 



them excellent minnow-tansies ; for being washed well in salt, 

 and their heads and tails cut off, and their guts taken out, and 

 not washed after, they prove excellent for that use ; that is, being 

 fried with y®lks of eggs, the flowers of cowslips and of prim- 

 roses, and a little tansie : thus used they make a dainty dish ot 

 meat. 



The loach is, as I told you, a most dainty fish : he breeds and 

 feeds in little and clear swift brooks or rills ; and lives there 

 upon the gravel, and in the sharpest streams : he grows not to be 

 above a finger long, and no thicker than is suitable to that length. 

 This loach is not unlike the shape of the eel ; he has a beard or 

 wattles like a barbel. He has two fins at his sides, four at his 

 belly, and one at his tail ; he is dappled with many black or 

 brown spots, his mouth is barbel-like under his nose. This fish 

 is usually full of eggs or spawn ; and is by Gesner, and other 

 learned physicians, commended for great nourishment, and to be 

 very grateful both to the palate and stomach of sick persons :* 

 he is to be fished for with a very small worm at the bottom, for 

 he very seldom or never rises above the gravel, on which I told 

 you he usually gets his living. 



The miller's-thumb, or bull-head, is a fish of no pleasing 

 shape. f He is by Gesner compared to the sea toad-fish, for his 



* The loach, or loche, Cobitis Barbatula, though very small, never 

 longer than four inches, is thought to be so great a delicacy on the Conti- 

 nent of Europe, that they have .been taken long distances and naturalized, 

 as by Frederick I. of Sweden, who (according to Linnaeus) had them 

 brought from Germany to his ovv^n country. Pesson-Maissonneuve {Ma- 

 nuel de Ptchcxir) says, that " in the spring and at the end of autumn, the 

 gastronomes prefer them to almost all the inhabitants of the water, espe- 

 cially when they have been smothered in wine or milk." — Am. Ed. 



t The river buU-liead {Cottus Gobio) derives its common name from the 

 shape of its head. It is very well described by Walton. The name of 

 miller's-thumb (droUy enough written by Aldrovandus among his English 

 names of fish, Mull erst honibe) is given to it, on account of the shape of its 

 head resembling very closely the thumb of a miller, which has a peculiar 

 form from its constant exercise in trying the character of the meal under 

 the spout. From the same thing came the proverbs, " Wortli a miller'a 

 thumb," and " An honest miller li;is a golden thumb." (See Yarrell.) The 

 miller's-thumb in England seldom exceeds four or five inches, though it is 

 sometimes larger on the Continent of Europe. — Am. Ed. 



