CHAP. I.] THE FIRST DAY. 47 



Pise. You know, gentlemen, it is an easy thing to scoff 

 at any art or recreation ; a little wit, mixed with ill-nature, 

 confidence, and malice, will do it ; but though they often 

 venture boldly, yet they are often caught, even in their own 

 trap, according to that of Lucian, the father of the family 

 of scoffers: 



Lucian, well skill'd in scoffing, this hath writ, 

 Friend, that's your folly, which you think your wit : 

 This you vent oft, void both of wit and fear, 

 Meaning another, when yourself you jeer. 



If to this you add what Solomon says of scoffers, that 

 they are an abomination to mankind, let him that thinks fit 

 scoff on, and be a scoffer still ; but I account them enemies 

 to me and all that love virtue and angling. 



And for you that have heard many grave, serious, men 

 pity anglers ; let me tell you, sir, there be many men that 

 are by others taken to be serious and grave men, whom we 

 contemn and pity. Men that are taken to be grave, because 

 nature hath made them of a sour complexion ; money-getting 

 men, men that spend all their time, first in getting, and next, 

 in anxious care to keep it ; men that are condemned to be 

 rich, and then always busy or discontented : for these poor 

 rich men, we anglers pity them perfectly, and stand in no 

 need to borrow their thoughts to think ourselves so happy. 

 No, no, sir, we enjoy a contentedness above the reach of such 

 dispositions, and as the learned and ingenuous Montaigne l 

 says like himself, freely, " when my cat and I entertain each 

 other with mutual apish tricks, as playing with a garter, who 

 knows but that I make my cat more sport than she makes 

 me ? Shall I conclude her to be simple, that has her time 

 to begin or refuse to play as freely as I myself have ? Nay, 

 who knows but that it is a defect of my not understanding 

 her language (for doubtless cats talk and reason with one 

 another) that we agree no better : and who knows but that 

 she pities me for being no wiser, than to play with her, and 

 laughs and censures my folly, for making sport for her, when 

 we two play together ? " 



1 In Montaigne's "Apology for Raimonde de Sehonde." The quotation is 

 a very free paraphrase of the original French, and not much like Florio's 

 translation, which Walton is supposed to have used. Am. ed. 



