6 LIFE OF IZAAK WALTON. 



sweetly inculcates, has hardly its fellow in any of the modern 

 languages. 



The truth is, that there are few subjects so barren as not to 

 afford matter of delight, and even of instruction, if ingeniously 

 treated : Montaigne has written an essay on Coaches, and 

 another on Thumbs ; and our own nation has produced many 

 men, who, from a peculiar felicity in their turn of thinking, and 

 manner of writing, have adorned, and even dignified, themes 

 the most dry and unpromising. Many would think that time 

 ill employed which was spent in composing a treatise on the 

 art of shooting in the long bow : and how few lovers of horti- 

 culture would expect entertainment from a discourse of Salads ! 

 and yet the Toxophilus of Roger Ascham, and the Acetaria of 

 Mr Evelyn, have been admired and commended by the best 

 judges of literature. 



But that the reader may determine for himself, how much 

 our author has contributed to the improvement of piscatory 

 science, and how far his work may be said to be an original, it 

 will be necessary for him to take a view of the state of angling 

 at the time when he wrote ; and that he may be the better able 

 to do this, he will consider, that, till the time of the Reforma- 

 tion, although the clergy,' as well regular as secular, on 

 account of their leisure, and because the canon law forbade them 

 the use of the sanguinary recreations of hunting, hawking, and 

 fowling, were the great proficients in angling, yet none of its 

 precepts were committed to writing ; and that, from the time 

 of the introduction of printing into this kingdom, to that of the 

 first publication of Walton's book, in 1653, an interval of more 

 than one hundred and fifty years, only five books on this sub- 

 ject had been given to the world ; of the four latest, some 

 mention is made in the margin ; * but the first of that number, 



* A. Booke of fishing with hooke and line, and of all other instruments 

 thereunto belonging. Another ofsundrie engines and traps to take pole- 

 cats, buzzards, rats, mice, and all other kinds of vermine and beasts 

 whatsoever, most profitable for all warriners, and such as delight in this 

 kind of sport and pastime, made by L. M. 4to. London, 1590, 1596, 

 1600. 



It appears by a variety of evidence, that the person meant by these 

 initials was one Leonard Mascall, an author who wrote on planting and 

 grafting, and also on cattle. Vide infra, chap. ix. 



Approved Experiments touching Fish and Fruit, to be reaarded by 

 the Lovers of Angling, by Mr John Taverner, in quarto, 1600. 



The Secrets of Angling, a poem, in three books, by J. D. [Davors,] 

 Esq. octavo, 1613. Mention is made of this book, in a note on a passage 

 in the ensuing dialogues : and there is reason to think that it is the founda- 

 tion of a treatise, entitled The whale Art ofAnuling, published in quarto, 



