26 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 



the attempt in despair, and passed the day under the trees, read 

 ing old Izaak ; satisfied that it was his fascinating vein of hon- 

 est simplicity and rural feeling that had bewitched me, and not 

 the passion for angling. 



"But above all, I recollect the 'good, honest, wholesome, 

 hungry ' repast, which we made under a beech-tree, just by a 

 spring of pure sweet water that stole out of the side of a hill ; 

 and how, when it was over one of the party read old Izaak 

 Walton's scene with the milkmaid, while I lay on the grass and 

 built castles in a bright pile of clouds until I fell asleep." 



The remainder of this elegant essay Mr. Irving devotes to the 

 character of an old Cheshire angler ; he concludes : "I could 

 not refrain from drawing the picture of this worthy ' brother of 

 the angle,' who has made me more than ever in love with the 

 theory, though I fear I shall never be adroit in the practice of 

 his art." 



This is precisely the treatment of our author which agrees 

 with our own views ; it requires not so much the love of angling, 

 as a relish for the general charms of nature, to render any per- 

 son of true taste delighted with his pages. We have spared 

 no effort to insure correct delineations of the FISH,* (the 

 whole having been painted from nature expressly for this edi- 

 tion], which will add to the character of the work as connected 

 with a popular branch of natural history, and truly may it be 

 said (after allowing the painter, in each instance, due praise) 



that the "gravers" also 



"had a strife, 

 With nature to outdo the life ! " 



The important and classical addition of the specific and 

 generic characters will speak for itself to proceed from a most 

 competent quarter. 



The notes, consistently with our view of the work, "in its 

 more important character of a British Classic," are devoted 



IT The list of engravings will show that some entirely new specimens of 

 fishes, by artists of the highest rank, are introduced in this edition. 



