I$6 THE COMPLETE ANGLER. [PART! 



And it is the rather to be believed, because you shall scarce or 

 never take a male Carp without a melt, or a female without a 

 roe or spawn, and for the most part very much ; and especially 

 all the summer season : and it is observed, that they breed 

 more naturally in ponds than in running waters, if they breed 

 there at all ; and that those that live in rivers are taken by men 

 of the best palates to be much the better meat. 



And it is observed, that in some ponds Carps will not breed, 

 especially in cold ponds; but where they will breed, they 

 breed innumerably : Aristotle and Pliny say, six times in a 

 year, if there be no Pikes nor Perch to devour their spawn when 

 it is cast upon grass, or flags, or weeds, where it lies ten or 

 twelve days before it be enlivened. 



The Carp, if he have water-room and good feed, will grow 

 to a very great bigness and length ; I have heard, to be much 

 above a yard long. 'Tis said by Jovius, who hath writ of 

 fishes, that in the Lake Lurian, in Italy, Carps have thriven 

 to be more than fifty pounds' weight ; which is the more 

 probable, for as the bear is conceived and born suddenly, and 

 being born is but short-lived, so, on the contrary, the ele- 

 phant is said to be two years in his dam's belly, some think he 

 is ten years in it, and being born grows in bigness twenty 

 years ; and 't is observed too that he lives to the age of a 

 hundred years. And 't is also observed, that the crocodile is 

 very long-lived, and more than that, that all that long life he 

 thrives in bigness : and so I think some Carps do, especially 

 in some places; though I never saw one above twenty-three 

 inches, which was a great and goodly fish ; but have been as- 

 sured there are of a far greater size, and in England too. 



Now, as the increase of Carps is wonderful for their number, 

 so there is not a reason found out, I think, by any, why they 

 should breed in some ponds and not in others of the same 

 nature for soil and all other circumstances. And as their 

 breeding, so are their decays also very mysterious : I have both 

 read it, and been told by a gentleman of tried honesty, that 



