EARLY REMINISCENCES. 5 



time and still loved the sport, not many questions were 



Being an only child, having lost my mother at an early 

 period, and my father being old and infirm, my school 

 vacations were chiefly devoted to the " gentle art," and in 



iny solitary rambles around the neighbourhood of W , 



both on the banks of my father's preserved water, and that of 

 the adjoining proprietors, where I had obtained permission 

 to fish, I not only perfected myself in the art of bottom 

 angling, but formed some curious acquaintances and asso- 

 ciations. 



Adjoining my father's estate, and merely separated by a 

 lane and rural bridge, lay the beautiful park and mansion 



of . The brook which had hitherto flowed through our 



own meadows in a humble and unpretending manner, became 

 a wider and more important stream upon its entrance into 

 the park, and finally discharged its waters into the Avon, 

 immediately in front of a noble old Elizabethan mansion; 

 and it was this conflux of the two streams that formed my 

 favourite angling ground, and where many a well-fed perch 

 was often transferred from its curling eddies to my fishing- 

 basket. The surrounding landscape was the very perfection 

 of park scenery : troops of deer reposing in picturesque 

 glades, noble trees, the growth of centuries, both singly and 

 in groups and avenues, stood in every variety of ornamental 

 position. Here, too, our immortal Bard of Avon is related 

 to have made rather free with the venison, and to have been 

 imprisoned by the relentless proprietor, who, if at all sensible 

 to the shafts of ridicule, must have subsequently very much 

 repented his severity. 



It was not without much difficulty and some manceuvring 

 on my part, that I obtained permission to follow up my 

 amusement here, and indeed I was the only person who pos- 

 sessed that privilege. The then proprietor, the last and 



