THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 117 



of his bag, and put them into a little box in his pocket, 

 where he would usually let them continue half an hour or 

 more, before he would bait his hook with them. I have 

 asked him his reason, and he has replied : " He did but pick 

 the best out to be in readiness against he baited his hook the 

 next time :" but he has been observed, both by others and 

 myself, to catch more fish than I or any other body that has 

 ever gone a-fishing with him could do, and especially salmons ; 

 .and I have been told lately by one of his most intimate and 

 secret friends, that the box in which he put those worms, 

 was anointed with a drop, or two or three, of the oil of ivy- 

 berries, made by expression or infusion ; and told, that by 

 the worms remaining in that box an hour, or a like time, 

 they had incorporated a kind of smell that was irresistibly 

 attractive, enough to force any fish within the smell of them, 

 to bite. This I heard not long since from a friend, but have 

 not tried it ; yet I grant it probable, and refer my reader to 

 Sir Francis Bacon's "Natural History," where he proves fishes 

 may hear, and doubtless can more probably smell : and I am 

 certain Gesner says the otter can smell in the water, and 1 

 know not but that fish may do so too ; it is left for a lover 

 of angling, or any that desires to improve that art, to try 

 this conclusion.* 



I shall also impart two other experiments (but not tried 

 by myself), which I will deliver in the same words that they 



* By the word " conclusion," Walton means " experiment." He was too 

 practical a bottom-fisher to have faith in scented baits. Respecting them, he 

 only writes what he had heard from others. Although many old angling 

 authors recommend perfumed baits, the use of them is ridiculed and exploded 

 by modern artists. Very justly in our opinion. ED. 



