CHAP. II. THE COMPLETE ANGLER. 285 



for a thousand pounds, nor fall off it for two : and yet I 

 think I dare venture on foot, though if you were not by 

 to laugh at me, I should do it on all four. 



Pise. Well, Sir, your mirth becomes you, and I am 

 glad to see you safe over, and now you are welcome into 

 Staffordshire. 



Viat. How, Staffordshire! What do I there, trow? 

 there is not a word of Staffordshire in all my direction. 



Pise. You see you are betrayed into it, but it shall be 

 in order to something that will make amends ; and 'tis 

 but an ill mile or two out of your way. 



Viat. I believe all things, Sir, and doubt nothing. Is 

 this your beloved river Dove? Tis clear and swift, indeed, 

 but a very little one. 



Pise. You see it, here, at the worst : we shall come to 

 it anon again, after two miles riding, and so near as to 

 lie upon the very banks. 



Viat. Would we were there once : but I hope we have 

 no more of these Alps to pass over. 



Pise. No, no, Sir, only this ascent before you, which 

 you see is not very uneasy, and then you will no more 

 quarrel with your way. 



Viat. Well, if ever I come to London, of which many 

 a man there, if he were in my place, would make a ques- 

 tion, I will sit down and write my travels ; and like Tom 

 Coriate, 1 print them at my own charge. Pray what do 

 you call this hill, we came down? 



(1) Tom Coriate lived io the reign of King James the First; and, as Wood 

 calls him, was the whetstone of all the wits of that age : and, indeed, the allu- 

 sions to him, and to the singular oddness of his character are numberless. He 

 travelled almost over Europe on foot; and in that tour walked 900 mile* with 

 one pair of shoes, which he got mended at Zurich. Afterwards he visited 

 Turkey, Persia, and the Great Mogul's dominions, travelling in so frugal a 

 manner, that as he tells his mother, in a letter to her in his ten mouths' 

 travels, between Aleppo and the Mogul's court, he spent but three pounds ster- 

 ling ; living remarkably well for about two pence sterling a day ; and of that 

 three pounds he elsewhere says, he was cozened of no less than ten shillings 

 sterling by certain Christians of the Armenian nation ; so that, indeed, he spent 



