THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 237 



smoothly on with your brush, and drive it thin : once doing, for 

 the most part, will serve, if you lay it well ; and if twice, be 

 sure your first color be thoroughly dry before you lay on a 

 second. 



Well, Scholar, having now taught you to paint your rod, and 

 we having still a mile to Tottenham High-Cross,* I will, as we 

 walk towards it, in the cool shade of this sweet honey-suckle 

 hedge, mention to you some of the thoughts and joys that have 

 possessed my soul since we two met together. And these 

 thoughts shall be told you, that you also may join with me in 

 thankfulness to the Giver of every good and perfect gift for our 

 happiness. And, that our present happiness may appear to be 

 the greater, and we the more thankful for it, I will beg you to 

 consider with me, how many do, even at this very time, lie under 

 the torment of the stone, the gout, and tooth-ache ; and this we 

 are free from. And every misery that I miss is a new mercy ; 

 and therefore let us be thankful. There have been, since we 

 met, others that have met disasters of broken limbs ; some have 

 been blasted ; others thunder-strucken ; and we have been freed 

 from these, and all those many miseries that threaten human na- 

 ture : let us therefore rejoice and be thankful. Nay, which is a 

 far greater mercy, we are free from the unsupportable burthen 

 of an accusing tormenting conscience, a misery that none can 

 bear ; and therefore let us praise Him for his preventing grace ; 

 and say. Every misery that I miss is a new mercy. Nay, let me 

 tell you, there be many that have forty times our estates, that 

 would give the greatest part of it to be healthful and cheerful 

 like us ; who, with the expense of a little money, have ate and 

 drank, and laughed, and angled, and sung, and slept securely; 

 and rose next day, and cast away care, and sung, and laughed, 

 and angled again ; which are blessings rich men cannot pur- 

 chase with all their money. Let me tell you. Scholar, I have a 

 rich neighbor, that is always so busy that he has no leisure to 

 laugh ; the whole business of his life is to get money, and more 



* All that follows to the place where Venator requires his Master's 

 courtesy with a bottle of " sack, milk, oranges and sugar,"' was added in 

 the fourth edition. The quaint, simple beauty of these moral reflections 

 recommends them to our hearts as well as to our taste.— ^w. Ed. 



