54 THE COMPLETE ANGLER, PART i. 



manner. And after this manner you may catch a trout in a hot 

 evening : when as you walk by a brook, and shall see or hear 

 him leap at flies, then if you get a grasshopper, put it on your 

 hook, with your line about two yards long, standing behind a 

 bush or tree where his hole is, and make your bait stir up and 

 down on the top of the water, you may, if you stand close, be 

 sure of a bite, but not sure to catch him, for he is not a leather- 

 mouthed fish : and after this manner you may fish for him with 

 almost any kind of live fly, but especially with a grasshopper. 



VEN. But before you go further, I pray, good master, what 

 mean you by a leather-mouthed fish ? 



PlSC. By a leather-mouthed fish I mean such as have their 

 teeth in their throat, as the chub or cheven, and so the barbel, 

 the gudgeon, and carp, and divers others have ; and the hook 

 being stuck into the leather or skin, or the mouth of such fish, 

 does very seldom or never lose its hold : but, on the contrary, 

 a pike, a perch, or trout, and so some other fish, which have 

 not their teeth in their throats, but in their mouths, which you 

 shall observe to be very full of bones, and the skin very thin, and 

 little of it ; I say, of these fish the hook never takes so sure 

 hold, but you often lose your fish, unless he have gorged it. 



VEN. I thank you, good master, for this observation ; but 

 now, what shall be done with my chub or cheven that I have 

 caught ? 



PlSC. Marry, sir, it shall be given away to some poor body, 

 for I'll warrant you I'll give you a trout for your supper: and 

 it is a good beginning of your art to offer your first-fruits to 

 the poor, who will both thank you and God for it, which I see 

 by your silence you seem to consent to. And for your willing- 

 ness to part with it so charitably, I will also teach more con- 

 cerning chub-fishing : you are to note that in March and April 

 he is usually taken with worms ; in May, June, and July, he will 

 bite at any fly, or at cherries, or at beetles with their legs and 

 wings cut off, or at any kind of snail, or at the black bee that 

 breeds in clay walls. And he never refuses a grasshopper, on 

 the top of a swift stream, nor, at the bottom, the young humble 

 bee that breeds in long grass, and is ordinarily found by the 



