208 ARTISTIC REPRESENTATIONS 



tilated by fish, with the heads of ferocious looking men. 

 These are exceedingly curious specimens of art in con- 

 nection with the craft of angling. 



In the early artistic labours of the Florentine engravers 

 we find several productions representing the practice of 

 angling in all its forms, as used in most countries at the 

 present day. There are some prints of this kind in the 

 British Museum of about the year 1400. 



There is a very curious etching of Albert Durer, repre- 

 senting the devil in the act of fishing, with lines or chains 

 from his mouth, armed with hooks, drawing three persons, 

 emblematical of beauty, bravery, and learning, after him. 

 This print is in the British Museum. 



In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, there were 

 several series of copper-plate engravings executed in Italy, 

 representing rod fishing. These exhibit great taste. The 

 river scenery, in all that have fallen under our own eye, 

 is exquisite. By an engraving of Antony and Cleopatra, 

 fishing seems to have been at one time a great favourite 

 in Egypt ; as there are several forms of it, executed 

 in different styles of art. There are a few Italian pictures 

 and engravings of the last and present century, on piscatory 

 subjects, but they are seldom to be met with in the or- 

 dinary collections of print-shops. 



The earliest caricatures of angling we have met with, 

 exclusive of the one lately found in Herculaneum, are 

 those by the Dutch artist Bruegel, published in 1556. 

 They are very curious. The specimens we have seen are 



