THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 45 



Pise. Sir, I am right glad to meet you, and glad to have 

 so fair an entrance into this day's sport, and glad to see so 

 many dogs and more men all in pursuit of the otter. Let us 

 compliment no longer, but join unto them. Come, honest 

 Venator, let ITS be gone, let us make haste ; I long to be 

 doing ; no reasonable hedge or ditch shall hold me. 



YEN. Gentleman-huntsman, where found you this otter ? 



HUNT. Marry, sir, we found her a mile from this place, 

 a-fishing. She has this morning eaten the greatest part of 

 this trout ; she has only left this much of it as you see, and 

 was fishing for more ; when we came we found her just at it; 

 but we were here very early, we were here an hour before 

 sunrise, and have given her no rest since we came ; sure, she 

 will hardly escape all these dogs and men. I am to have the 

 skin, if we kill her. 



VEN. Why, sir, what is the skin worth 1 



HUNT. It is worth ten shillings to make gloves ; the gloves 

 of an otter are the best fortification for your hands that can 

 be thought on against wet weather. 



Pise. I pray, honest huntsman, let me ask you a pleasant 

 question ; do you hunt a beast or a fish ] 



HUNT. Sir, it is not in my power to resolve you ; I leave 

 it to be resolved by the college of Carthusians, who have 

 made vows never to eat flesh. But I have heard the ques- 

 tion hath been debated among many great clerks, arid they 

 seem to differ about it ; yet most agree that her tail is fish ; 

 and if her body be fish too, then I may say that a fish will 

 walk upon land ; for an otter does so, sometimes, five or six 

 or ten miles in a night, to catch for her young ones, or to 

 glut herself with fish. And I can tell you that pigeons will 

 fly forty miles for a breakfast ; but, sir, I am sure the otter 

 devours much fish, and kills and spoils much more than he 

 eats. And I can tell you that this dog-fisher, for so the 

 Latins call him, can smell a fish in the water a hundred yards 

 from him : Gesner says much farther ; and that his stones 

 are good against the falling sickness ; and that there is an 

 herb, benione, which being hung in a linen cloth, near a fish 

 pond, or any haunt that lie uses, makes him to avoid the 

 place ; which proves he smells both by water and land ; and 

 I can tell you there is brave hunting this water-dog in Corn- 

 wall, where there have been so many, that our learned 

 Camden says, there is a river called Ottersey, which was so 



