24 THE COMPLETE ANGLER. PART I. 



mentions the like in England, and the like in Lochmere 

 in Ireland. There is also a river in Arabia, of which all 

 the sheep that drink thereof have their wool turned into a 

 vermilion colour. And one of no less credit than Aristotle, 

 tells us of a merry river, the river Elusina, Jhat dances at 

 the noise of music, for with music it bubbles, dances, and 

 grows sandy, and so continues till the music ceases, but 

 then it presently returns to its wonted calmness and 

 clearness. And Camden tells us of a well near to Kirby, 

 in Westmoreland, that ebbs and flows several times every 

 day : and he tells us of a river in Surrey, (it is called 

 Mole,) that after it has run several miles, being opposed 

 by hills, finds or makes itself a way under ground, and 

 breaks out again so far off, that the inhabitants thereabout 

 boast as the Spaniards do of their river Anus, that they 

 feed divers flocks of sheep upon a bridge. And lastly, 

 for I would not tire your patience, one of no less authority 

 than Josephus, that learned Jew, tells us of a river in 

 Judea that inns swiftly all the six days of the week, and 

 stands still and rests all their sabbath. 



But I will lay aside my discourse of rivers, and tell you 

 some things of the monsters, or fish, call them what you 

 will, that they breed and feed in them. Pliny the philo- 

 sopher says, in the third chapter of his ninth book, that 

 in the Indian Sea, the fish called Balcena or Whirlpool, is 

 so long and broad, as to take up more in length and 

 breadth than two acres of ground ; and, of other fish of 

 two hundred cubits long ; and that in the river Ganges, 

 there be Eels of thirty feet long. He says there, that 

 these monsters appear in that sea, only when the tempes- 

 tuous winds oppose the torrents of waters falling from the 

 rocks into it, and so turning what lay at the bottom to be 

 seen on the water's top. And he says, that the people of 

 Cadara, an island near this place, make the timber for 

 their houses of those fish-bones. He there tells us, that 



