CHAP. IX.] THE COMPLETE ANGLER. . l6l 



easily got, get other flour, and then mix these together, and 

 put to them either sugar, or honey, which I think better ; and 

 then beat these together in a mortar, or sometimes work them 

 in your hands, your hands being very clean ; and then make it 

 into a ball, or two, or three, as you like best for your use ; but 

 you must work or pound it so long in the mortar, as to make 

 it so tough as to hang upon your hook without washing from 

 it, yet not too hard : or that you may the better keep it on 

 your hook, you may knead with your paste a little, and not 

 much, white or yellowish wool. 



And if you would have this paste keep all the year for any 

 other fish, then mix with it virgin-wax and clarified honey, 

 and work them together with your hands before the fire ; then 

 make these into balls, and they will keep all the year. 



And if you fish for a Carp with gentles, then put upon your 

 hook a small piece of scarlet about this bigness | |, it being 

 soaked in, or anointed with oil of peter, called by some oil of 

 the rock : and if your gentles be put, two or three days before, 

 into a box or horn anointed with honey, and so put upon your 

 hook as to preserve them to be living, you are as like to kill 

 this crafty fish this way as any other : but still as you are fish- 

 ing, chew a little white or brown bread in your mouth, and 

 cast it into the pond about the place where your float swims. 

 Other baits there be; but these, with diligence and patient 

 watchfulness, will do it better than any that I have ever prac- 

 tised or heard of: and yet I shall tell you, that the crumbs of 

 white bread and honey made into a paste is a good bait for a 

 Carp ; and you know it is more easily made. And having said 

 thus much of the Carp, my next discourse shall be of the 

 Bream, which shall not prove so tedious : and therefore I de- 

 sire the continuance of your attention. 



But first I will tell you how to make this Carp, that is so 

 curious to be caught, so curious a dish of meat, as shall make 

 him worth all your labor and patience ; and though it is not 

 without some trouble and charges, yet it will recompense both. 



