PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. 



HE reception which the " Practical 

 Angler" met with when first pub- 

 lished, four years ago, was highly 

 gratifying. The press, as our readers will 

 see by the appendix to this volume, ex- 

 pressed a very favourable opinion ; and 

 since then it has gone through three 

 editions an amount of success which shows 

 clearly that what the angling community now 

 want, is not another amusing description of the 

 pleasures of angling, but a book to teach them 

 how to fish. 



In other respects, also, the success of the 

 " Practical Angler " has been quite up to our 

 expectations, not that it has made a first-rate 

 angler of every one who has read its pages ; 

 very far from- this. It is one thing to be told 

 how to fish, it is another and much more diffi- 

 cult thing to do it successfully ; but the theory 

 of angling therein explained has been generally 



