CHAP. I. THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 25 



there are sometimes a thousand of these great Eels found 

 wrapt, or .interwoven together. He tells us there, that it 

 appears that dolphins love music, and will come when 

 called for, by some men or boys that know, and use to 

 feed them ; and that they can swim as swift as an arrow can 

 be shot out of a bow ; and much of this is spoken concern- 

 ing the dolphin, and other fish, as may be found also in 

 the learned Dr. Casaubon's * Discourse of Credulity and 

 Incredulity, printed by him about the year 1670. 



I know, we Islanders are averse to the belief of these 

 wonders ; but there be so many strange creatures to be 

 new seen, many collected by John Tradescant, 2 and others 



(1) Meric, *ou of Isaac Caiaubon, horn at Geneva in. 15Q9. but educated at 

 Oxford, was, for his great learning, preferred to a Prebend in the Cathedral of 

 Canterbury, and the Rectory of Ickham near that city. Oliver Cromwell would 

 have engaged him, by a pension of 300/. a year, to write tht history of his time, 

 hut Catauboo refused it. Of many books extant of his writing, that mentioned 

 iu the text is one. He dird in 1(571, leaving behind him the character of a reli- 

 gious man, loyal to his Prince, exemplary iu his life and conversation, and very 

 charitable to the poor. Athen. Oxon. Vol. II. 485, edit. 1721. 



(2) There were, it teems, three of the Tradttcantt, grandfather, father, and 

 son : the son is the person here meant : the two former were Gardeners to Queen 

 Elizabeth, and the latter to King Charles the First. They were all great bota- 

 nists, and collectors of natural and other curiosities, and dwelt at South Lam- 

 beth, in Surrey ; and dying there, were buried in Lambeth Church-yard. Mr. 

 Ashmole contracted an acquaintance with the last of them, and, together with 

 his wife, boarded at his house for a summer, during which Ashmole agreed for 

 the purchase of Tradescant s collection, and the same was conveyed to him by 

 a deed of gift from Tradr scant and his wife. Tradescant soon after died, and 

 Ashmole was obliged to file a bill in Chancery for the delivery of the curiosi- 

 ties, and succeeded in his suit. Mrs. Tradescaat. shortly after the pronouncing 

 the decree, was found drowned in her pond. This collection, with what additions 

 he afterwards mde to it, Mr. Ashmole gave to the University of Oxford, and 

 so became the Founder of the Athmolean Museum. A monument for the three 

 Tradescants, very curiously ornamented with sculptures, is to be seen in Lam- 

 beth Church-yard ; aud a representation thereof, in four plates, and also some 

 particulars of the family, are given in the Philosophical Transactions, Volume 

 LXII1. Part I. p. 79, <-t ttq. The monument, by the contribution of some 

 friends to their memory, was, in the year 1773, repaired ; and the following Line*, 

 formerly intended for an epitaph, inserted thereon : 



Know, stranger ! ere thou pass, beneath this stone 

 Lies John Tradcscuiit, graudsire, father, son. 

 The last dy'd in his spring: the other two 

 Liv'd till they had travell'd art and nature thro'; 

 As by their choice collections m?.y appear, 

 Of what is rare in land, in seas, in air; 



