138 THE COMPLETE ANGLEE. [PART I. 



they be easily carried about an angler ; and be of excellent 

 use, for note, that a large trout will come as fiercely at a 

 minnow, as the highest mettled hawk doth seize on a par- 

 tridge, or a greyhound on a hare. I have been told that 160 

 minnows have been found in a trout's belly ; either the trout 

 had devoured so many, or the miller that gave it a friend of 

 mine had forced them down his throat after he had taken him. 



Now for flies ; which is the third bait wherewith trouts 

 are usually taken. You are to know, that there are so 

 many sorts of flies as there be of fruits : I will name you 

 but some of them ; as the dun-fly, the stone-fly, the red-fly, 

 the moor-fly, the tawny-fly, the shell-fly, the cloudy or 

 blackish-fly, the flag-fly, the vine-fly : there be of flies 

 caterpillars, and canker-flies, and bear-flies ; and indeed too 

 many either for me to name, or for you to remember. And 

 their breeding is so various and w:onderful, that I might 

 easily amaze myself, and tire you in a relation of them. 



And, yet, I will exercise your promised patience by saying 

 a little of the caterpillar, or the palmer-fly or worm ; that 

 by them you may guess what a work it were, in a discourse, 

 but to run over those very many flies, worms, and little 

 living creatures, with which the sun and summer adorn and 

 beautify the river-banks, and meadows ; both for the re- 

 creation and contemplation of us anglers, pleasures which, 

 I think, myself enjoy more than any other man that is not 

 of my profession. 



Pliny holds an opinion, that many have their birth, or 

 being, from a dew that in the spring falls upon the leaves of 

 trees ; and that some kinds of them are from a dew left upon 

 herbs or flowers, and others from a dew left upon the cole- 

 worts or cabbages. All which kinds of dews being thickened 

 and condensed, are by the sun's generative heat, most of 

 them, hatched, and, in these days, made living creatures : l 

 and these of several shapes and colours ; some being hard 

 and tough, some smooth and soft ; some are horned in their 

 head, some in their tail, some have none ; some have hair, 



1 The doctrine of spontaneous or equivocal generation is now universally 

 exploded ; and all the phenomena that seem to support it are accounted 

 for on other principles. Some naturalists for a long time still clung to it 

 in respect to minute animalcules, but the researches of Ehrenberg have, 

 removed, all doubts, ED. ,, 



