33$ THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 



perience, and of equal freedom to communicate it ; one that 

 loves me and my art ; one to whom I have been beholden 

 for many of the choicest observations that I have imparted 

 to you. This good man, that dares do anything rather than 

 tell an untruth, did, I say, tell me he had lately dissected 

 one strange fish, and he thus described it to me : 



" The fish was almost a yard broad, and twice that length ; 

 his mouth wide enough to receive, or take into it, the head 

 of a man ; his stomach, seven or eight inches broad. He is 

 of a slow motion, and usually lies or lurks close in the mud, 

 and has a movable string on his head, about a span or near 

 unto a quarter of a yard long, by the moving of which, with 

 his natural bait, when he lies close and unseen in the mud, 

 he draws other fish so close to him trat he can suck them 

 into his mouth, and so devours and digests them." 1 



And, scholar, do not wonder at this, for besides the credit 

 of the relator, you are to note, many of these, and fishes 

 that are of the like and more unusual shapes, are very often 

 taken on the mouths of our sea-rivers, and on the sea-shore. 

 And this will be no wonder to any that have travelled Egypt ; 

 where 't is known the famous river Nilus does not only breed 

 fishes that yet want names, but by the overflowing of that 

 river, and the help of the sun's heat on the fat slime which 

 that river leaves on the banks when it falls back into its 

 natural channel, such strange fish and beasts are also bred, 

 that no man can give a name to, as Grotius, in his "Sophom," 

 and others, have observed. 2 



But whither am I strayed in this discourse ? I will end it 

 by telling you, that at the mouth of some of these rivers of 

 ours herrings are so plentiful, as namely, near to Yarmoutl 

 in Norfolk, and in the west country pilchers so very plenti- 



