The Compleat ^Angler 



(I mean a little of it) that the white may appear, and so pull off the 

 husk on the cloven side (as I directed you) and then cutting off a 

 very little of the other end, that so your hook may enter ; and if 

 your hook be small and good, you will find this to be a very choice 

 bait either for winter or summer, you sometimes casting a little of it 

 into the place where your float swims. 



And to take the roach and dace, a good bait is the young brood 

 of wasps or bees, if you dip their heads in blood ; especially good 

 for bream, if they be baked or hardened in their husks in an oven, 

 after the bread is taken out of it, or hardened on a fire shovel ; and 

 so also is the thick blood of sheep, being half dried on a trencher, 

 that so you may cut it into such pieces as may best fit the size of 

 your hook, and a little salt keeps it from growing black, and makes 

 it not the worse but better : this is taken to be a choice bait if 

 rightly ordered. 



There be several oils of a strong smell that I have been told of, 

 and to be excellent to tempt fish to bite, of which I could say much ; 

 but I remember I once carried a small bottle from Sir George 

 Hastings to Sir Henry Wotton (they were both chymical men) as a 

 great present ; it was sent and received, and used with great con- 

 fidence ; and yet upon inquiry, I found it did not answer the 



217 p 



