CHAP. XVII.] THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 205 



fire-shovel : and so also is the thick blood of sheep, being half 

 dried on a trencher, that so you may cut it into such pieces as 

 may best fit the size of your hook ; and a little salt keeps it from 

 growing black, and makes it not the worse, but better : this is 

 taken to be a choice bait if rightly ordered. 



There be several oils of a strong smell that I have been told 

 of, and to be excellent to tempt fish to bite, of which I could 

 say much. But I remember I once carried a small bottle from 

 Sir George Hastings to Sir Henry Wotton, they were both 

 chemical men, as a great present : it was sent, and received, and 

 used, with great confidence ; and yet, upon inquiry, I found it 

 did not answer the expectation of Sir Henry ; which, with the 

 help of this and other circumstances, makes me have little belief 

 in such things as many men talk of. Not but that I think fishes 

 both smell and hear, as I have expressed in my former discourse : 

 but there is a mysterious knack, which though it be much easier 

 than the philosopher's stone, yet is not attainable by common 

 capacities, or else lies locked up in the brain or breast of some 

 chemical man, that, like the Rosi crucians, will not yet reveal 

 it. But let me nevertheless tell you, that camphor, put with 

 moss into your worm-bag with your worms, makes them, if 

 many Anglers be not very much mistaken, a tempting bait, and 

 the Angler more fortunate. But I stepped by chance into this 

 discourse of oils, and fishes smelling ; and though there might 

 be more said, both of it and of baits for Roach and Dace, and 

 other float-fish, yet I will forbear it at this time, and tell you in 

 the next place how you are to prepare your tackling : concern- 

 ing which, I will, for sport-sake, give you an old rhyme out of 

 an old fish-book, which will prove a part, and but a part, of 

 what you are to provide. 



" My rod and my line, my float and my lead, 



My hook and my plummet, my whetstone and knife, 

 My basket, my baits both living and dead, 



My net and my meat, for that is the chief : 

 Then I must have thread, and hairs green and small, 

 With mine Angling-purse, and so you have all." 



