198 THE COMPLETE ANGLER. [PARTI. 



Put your hook into his mouth, which you may easily do 

 from the middle of April till August ; and then the frog's 

 mouth grows up, and he continues so for at least six months 

 without eating, but is sustained, none, but He whose Name 

 is Wonderful, knows how : I say, put your hook, I mean 

 the arming-wire, through his mouth, and out at his gills, 

 and then with a fine needle and silk sew the upper part of 

 his leg with only one stitch to the arming- wire of your hook, 

 or tie the frog's leg above the upper joint to the armed 

 wire ; and in so doing, use him as though you loved him, 

 that is, harm him as little as you may possibly, that he may 

 live the longer. 1 



And now, having given you this direction for the baiting 

 your ledger-hook with a live fish or frog, my next must be 

 to tell you, how your hook thus baited must or may be 

 used : and it is thus. Having fastened your hook to a line, 

 which if it be not fourteen yards long, should not be less 

 than twelve, you are to fasten that line to any bough 2 near 

 to a hole where a pike is, or is likely to lie, or to have a 

 haunt ; and then wind your line on any forked stick, all 

 your line, except half a yard of it, or rather more ; and split 

 that forked stick with such a nick or notch at one end of it, 

 as may keep the line from any more of it ravelling from 

 about the stick than so much of it as you intend. And 

 choose your forked stick to be of that bigness as may keep 

 the fish or frog from pulling the forked stick under the 

 water till the pike bites, and then the pike having pulled the 

 line forth of the cleft or nick of that stick in which it was 

 gently fastened, he will have line enough to go to his hold 

 and pouch the bait. ^Pnd if you would have this Ledger- 

 bait to keep at a fixed place, undisturbed by wind or other 



1 It is presumed to be upon this passage that Lord Byron founds his 

 charge of cruelty against Walton in the following well-known lines : 



" That quaint, old, cruel coxcomb, in his gullet 

 Should have a hook, and a small trout to pull it." 



" Don Juan," canto xiii. 



In extenuation it should be observed that Walton copied this recipe from 

 the "Book of St. Alban's." ED. 



2 Or in default of a bough, a stake : you may lay several of these at 

 distances, and this is called trimmer fishing. BROWNE. 



