LIFE OF IZAAK WALTON. 7 



as well on account of its quaintness as antiquity, and because 

 it is not a little characteristic of the age when it was written, 

 deserves to be particularly distinguished. This tract, entitled 

 The Treatyse of Fysshynge with an Angle, makes part of a 

 book, like many others of that early time, without a title ; but 

 which, by the colophon, appears to have been printed at 

 Westminster, by Wynkyn de Worde, 1496, in a small folio, 

 containing a treatise On Hawking ; another, On Hunting, in 

 verse, the latter taken, as it seems, from a tract, on that 

 subject, written by old Sir Tristram, an ancient forester, cited 

 in the Forest Laws of Manwood, chap. iv. in sundry places ; a 

 book wherein is determined the Lygnage of Cote Armures ; the 

 above mentioned treatise Of fishing ; and the method of Blasynge 

 of Armes. 



The book printed by Wynkyn de Worde is, in truth, a 

 ropublication of one known to the curious by the name of the 

 Book of St Allan's, it appearing by the colophon to have been 

 printed there, in 1486, and, as it seems, with Caxton's letter.* 

 Wynkyn de Worde's impression has the addition of the treatise 

 Of Fishing ; of which only it concerns us to speak. 



The several tracts contained in the above mentioned two 

 impressions of the same book, were compiled by Dame Julyans 

 (or Juliana) Berners, Bernes, or Barnes, prioress of the 

 nunnery of Sopwell, near St Alban's ; a lady of a noble family, 

 and celebrated for her learning and accomplishments, by 

 Leland, Bale, Pits, Bishop Tanner, and others. And the 

 reason for her publishing it, in the manner it appears in, she 

 gives us in the following words : " And for by cause that 

 this present treatyse sholde not come to the hondys of eche 

 ydle persone whyche wolde desire it, yf it were enprynted 

 allone by itself and put in a lytyll ^plaunflet ; therefore I have 

 compylyd it in a greter uolume, of dyuerse bokys concernynge 

 to gentyll and noble men, to the entent that the forsayd'ydle 

 persones whyche sholde haue but lytyll mesure in the sayd 



1656, by the well known Gervase Markham, as part of his Country Con- 

 tentments, or Husbandman's Recreations, since he confesses, that the 

 substance of his book was originally in rhyme. Of Markham's book, a 

 specimen is given in chap. i. 



Barker's Art of Angling, printed in 12mo. in 1651, and again in 4to. in 

 1653. A third edition was published in 1659, under the title of Barker's 

 Delight, or the Art of Angling. For an account of this book and ita author, 

 vide infra. -J. S. H. 



Vide Biographica Britannica, art. Caxton, note L. wherein the 

 author, Mr Oldys, has given a copious account of the book, and a character 

 of the lady who compiled it. 



