CHAP. I. THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 39 



nor dimmed his eyes, nor weakened his memory, nor made 

 any of the faculties of his mind weak or useless." It is 

 said that Angling and temperance were great causes of 

 these blessings. And I wish the like to all that imitate 

 him, and love the memory of so good a man. 



My next and last example shall be that undervaluer of 

 money, the late provost of Eton College, Sir Henry 

 Wotton, 1 (a man with whom I have often fished and 

 conversed,) a man whose foreign employments in the 

 service of this nation, and whose experience, learning, 

 wit, and cheerfulness, made his company to be esteemed 

 one of the delights of mankind. This man, whose very 

 approbation of Angling were sufficient to convince any 

 modest censurer of it, this man was also a most dear 

 lover, and a frequent practiser of the art of Angling; 

 of which he would say, " it was an employment for 

 his idle time, which was not then idly spent; for Ang- 

 ling was, after a tedious study, a rest to his mind, a 

 cheerer of his spirits, a diverter of sadness, a calmer of 

 unquiet thoughts, a moderator of passions, a procurer 

 of contentedness;" and " that it begat habits of peace 

 and patience in those that professed and practised it." 

 Indeed, my friend, you will find Angling to be like the 

 virtue of Humility, which has a calmness of spirit, and 

 a world of other blessings attending upon it. Sir, this 

 was the saying of that learned man. 



And I do easily believe, that peace, and patience, and 

 a calm content, did cohabit in the cheerful heart of Sir 

 Henry Wotton, because I know that when he was 

 beyond seventy years of age, he made this description of 

 a part of the present pleasure that possessed him, as he 

 sat quietly, in a summer's evening, on a bank a fishing. 

 It is a description of the spring; which, because it 



(1) Of whom ee an account in the L\fe of Walton. 



