CHAP. VIII. THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 129 



that shall be bigger than his belly or throat will receive, 

 and swallow a part of him, and let. the other part remain 

 in his mouth till the swallowed part be digested, and then 

 swallow that other part, that was in his mouth, and so 

 put it over by degrees ; which is not unlike the Ox, and. 

 some other beasts taking their meat, not out of their 

 mouth immediately into their belly, but first into some 

 place betwixt, and then chew it, or digest it by degrees 

 after, which is called chewing the cud. And, doubtless, 

 Pikes will bite when they are not hungry ; but, as some 

 think, even for very anger, when a tempting bait comes 

 near to them. 



And it is observed that the Pike will eat venomous 

 things, as some kind of frogs are, and yet live without 

 being harmed by them ; for as some say, he has in him a 

 natural balsam, or antidote against all poison. And he 

 has a strange heat, that though it appears to us to be cold, 

 can yet digest or put over any fish-flesh, by degrees, with- 

 out being sick. And others observe that he never eats the 

 venomous frog till he have first killed her, and then as 

 ducks are observed to do to frogs in spawning-time, at 

 which time some frogs are observed to be venomous, so 

 thoroughly washed her, by tumbling her up and down in 

 the water, that he may devour her without danger. And 

 Gesner affirms, that a Polonian gentleman did faithfully 

 assure him he had seen two young geese at one time in 

 the belly of a Pike. And doubtless a Pike in his height 

 of hunger will bite at and devour a dog that swims in a 

 pond ; and there have been examples of it, or the like ; 

 for as I told you, " the belly has no ears when hunger 

 comes upon it." 



The same Author relates, from a book entitled Vox Piscia, printed in 1626, 

 that one Mr. Anderson, a townsman and merchant of Newcastle, talking wilh a 

 friend on Newcastle bridge, and fingering his ring, let it fall into the river; but 

 it having been swallowed by a fish, and the fish afterwards taken, the ring was 

 fonnd and restored to him. Worthies, Northumberland, 310. A like story is, 

 by Herodotus, related of Polycrates king of Samos. 



