THE COMPLETE ANGLEE. 147 



as Lincolnshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, and Nottinghamshire. 

 They do not fancy rapid rivers, and happily are absent from those 

 mountainous streams, the habitats of the salmon and trout. There are 

 many good pike-pools in the Thames, all the way up from Hampton to 

 Sonning, but the best pike-water near London is the Tring reservoir, in 

 Buckinghamshire. ED.] 



CHAPTER IX. 



OBSERVATIONS ON THE CARP ; WITH DIRECTIONS HOW TO 

 FISH FOR HIM. 



Pise. The Carp is the queen of rivers ; a stately, a good, 

 and a very subtle fish ; that was not at first bred, nor hath 

 been long in England, but is now naturalised. It is said, 

 they were brought hither by one Mr. Mascal, a gentleman 

 that then lived at Plumsted, in Sussex, a county that abounds 

 more with fish than any in this nation. 



You may remember that I told you Gesner says there are 

 no pikes in Spain : and doubtless there was a time, about a 

 hundred or a few more years ago, when there were no carps 

 in England, as may seem to be affirmed by Sir Richard Baker, 

 in whose " Chronicle" you may find these verses : 



Hops and turkeys, carps and beer, 

 Came into England all in a year. 



And doubtless, as of sea-fish the herring dies soonest out 

 of the w^ter, and of fresh-water fish, the trout, so, except the 

 eel, the carp endures most hardness, and lives longest out of 

 his own proper element. And, therefore, the report of the 

 carp's being brought out of a foreign country into this nation 

 is the more probable. 



Carps and loaches are observed to breed several months in 

 one year, which pikes and most other fish do not. And this 

 is partly proved by tame and wild rabbits ; and also by some 

 ducks, which will lay eggs nine of the twelve months ; and 

 yet there be other ducks that lay npt longer than about one 

 month. And it is the rather to be believed, because you 

 shall scarce or never take a male carp without a melt, and a 

 female without a roe or spawn, and for the most part, very 



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